Low Vision Blog

This week I met my niece for supper who ran her first Boston Marathon. A cross country runner in high school and college, running is one of her passions.  Although she is fully sighted, did you know that many visually impaired people run the Boston Marathon?  In fact this year’s 2017 Boston Marathon marks the […]

Bascom Palmer Eye Institute in Miami, FL is collaborating with Stanford University in California to determine if a photothermal laser that is non-damaging to the macula versus a sham laser therapy will benefit patients with dry age-related macular degeneration (AMD)  who have high-risk drusen.  The goal of the study is to see if treating macular […]

Recent reports on the safety and long-term side-effects of a clinical trial that was listed at www.clinicaltrials.gov for macular degeneration has raised lots of questions on how clinical trials work and who should consider becoming a participant.  Here are some of the basics of clinical trials to provide you with a better understanding of how […]

“An important pathological characteristic of age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the accumulation of lipofuscin in the retinal pigment epithelium (RPE). Lipofuscin may interfere with normal RPE cellular function and result in RPE death with associated loss of overlying photoreceptors.” according to the authors of The Role of Vitamin A in the Progression of Dry AMD.  […]

When preparing a home for a person with a visual impairment, it’s just as important to know what not to do as it is to know what to do. Sometimes in working to prepare a home, people make too many changes or over correct too much. The result can be too much lighting, too little […]

There are several different types of implantable lenses that are becoming available to those with macular degeneration.  Some are implanted in one eye, some are implanted in both eyes and now a new lens may involve the implantation of two lenses in one eye.   The recently designed Scharioth Macula Lens (SML) by Gabor Scharioth, MD, […]

Ms. Ima Hapenow was devastated by the news that her ophthalmologist gave her last summer that she has macular degeneration and she is considered legally blind. In the past six months it has been such a disappointment to not be able to do all those things that she has always taken for granted. But today […]

You have a new roommate, who is visually impaired. Perhaps they have been so their entire life, or maybe his/her visual impairment occurred more recently, becoming a burden for them to face alone. It’s a good idea to take some time to try to understand what it’s like for this person as you accept them […]

Fluctuating vision is a common concern for those with chronic eye diseases.  One day your vision may be sharper and clearer than normal and the next it’s blurred and the clarity seems to have disappeared.  “My vision fluctuates from day to day” or “ I notice differences from day to day and some days my […]

Recently my husband and I decided to take an afternoon to explore a new housing development that included 11 model homes with the latest in home decorating from window treatments to flooring to light fixtures.  As we walked into any room the lights automatically turned on and when we left, they automatically turned off.  The […]