After years of intensive public education efforts about the causes and symptoms of a mysterious hallucinatory condition affecting visually impaired people, Prevent Blindness and other patient advocacy organizations are pleased that Charles Bonnet Syndrome will soon be officially recognized by eye care professionals around the world. As described in the latest revision of the International […]
This is our 14th annual summary presented to the International Low Vision Support Group about leading research and developments during the past 12 months in the fields of blindness and low vision. Most activity has been in the fields of anti-VEGF treatment and gene replacement therapy. We have also seen promising work with stem cell […]
Nearly every reliable resource on age-related macular degeneration (AMD) will reveal that more women than men are affected by the disease. Some even go so far as to offer questionable statistics like “About 2/3 of people with AMD are women and 1/3 men”.(1) To explain, writers offer that women live longer than men, or that […]
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. has announced FDA approval of Eylea (aflibercept) injection to treat all stages of diabetic retinopathy. Eylea is already approved for treatment of three conditions: neovascular (wet) age-related macular degeneration, macular edema resulting from retinal vein occlusion, and diabetic macular edema. This additional use of Eylea for diabetic retinopathy was approved based upon […]
Recent research spotlights a need to address certain risks and incapacities with which people with visual impairment are faced during hospital stays. Vision-impaired hospital patients have worse clinical outcomes, more readmissions, longer lengths of stay, and higher costs of care than non-vision-impaired patients, according to the authors. The article, published April 4, 2019 in JAMA […]
Low vision presents many challenges in managing daily living activities, with one of the most important being spot reading. This includes reading labels, instructions, envelope addresses, checkbooks, receipts, menus, food containers, recipes, clocks, signs, written notes, currency values, and on and on. With loss of functional eyesight, such normally routine tasks require either accommodating, seeking […]
Australian investigators have found that patients who consumed two or more eggs per week reduced their risk of developing wet age-related macular degeneration (wAMD) by 62% compared to those who consumed 1 or fewer. More than 3,600 patients from the Blue Mountains Eye Study, aged 49+ years, were examined across a 15-year follow-up period. 2,034 […]
Alkahest Inc. has reported that AKST4290, an oral medication for treatment of wet AMD, was shown in trials to be safe, effective, and “extremely promising”. Speaking at the 2019 Retina World Congress, Michael Stewart, MD (Mayo Clinic, Jacksonville), reported that 83% of subjects’ eyes had improved acuity of a mean 7+ letters, and 21% gained […]
Eye exams may soon serve a larger purpose than detecting vision changes. Because the retina is an extension of the brain and shares many similarities with the brain, researchers believe that the deterioration in the retina may mirror the changes going on in the blood vessels in the brain, thereby offering a window into the […]
Google has created a new Android app to help the visually impaired. Similar to Microsoft’s Seeing AI for Apple devices, the application, named Lookout, uses artificial intelligence (AI) to identify objects, read text, scan barcodes, and identify currencies. It is available to download though only for Google’s Pixel devices in the U.S. at this time. It is not clear […]