...but my wife said "that's a bad eyed deer."
Hello - I went in for my routine eye exam and the doctor is seeing evidence of macular degeneration. She referred me to a specialist, and I have an appointment next week. I was told it would take three hours to complete.
What should I know while I wait? How concerned should I be? Any questions I should ask the specialist?
I haven't noticed any significant changes in my vision over the last few years, although my prescription has evolved. No dead zones, no wavy lines. Today's doc said my new prescription will take me to 20/20 vision.
I wear glasses regularly, but not contacts. I just turned 44 and quit smoking over 15 years ago. I'm maybe ten pounds overweight, but nobody would consider me obese.
Thanks for reading!
Update 12.8.2021
Saw the doc in Las Vegas. After a little research I learned he was well respected in town.
Details are this: I had no injections or IV for scans. I was dilated and generally both blurred and bored for two hours. One of the tests was not exactly pleasant and involved a very bright light being pointed in my eyes while I was instructed to look in different directions.
He does not think it's macular degeneration. He isn't exactly sure what it is and wants me to go have scans done next month to establish a baseline. He listed many things we could do "if he was a quack" but that we should monitor for now and not worry. He literally said "don't change anything." He said what he's seeing could have been there my whole life, and we're only now seeing it because of new technology at the ophthalmologist's office. Possible scar tissue was mentioned. He said it wasn't blood for certain. That's my update - I'll report back if there is something notable on the scans next month. Thanks!
Hello everyone.
I have low vision due to glaucoma and macular degeneration. In the last 2 years it has been difficult to maintain my vision and my eyes are more tired than ever.
Due to macular degeneration, I get Eylea injections at the hospital. In the past 11 years, this is the only thing that they do (I am 29yo). There is no frequency in the injections. The doctors look at the OCT exam, but sometimes they cannot see any changes, however due to my eye complaining, they decide to move forward with the injections.
In the past 3/4 months I got 3 injections in the same eye. The last one was terrible… I got a bad hospital bacterial infection in that eye. I had to receive several intravitreal antibiotic injections and had two surgeries (one of was vitrectomy).
If there is anyone with a similar situation - macular generation and Eylea injections - how long have you been doing these injections? Are they making your sight better? How do you feel?
I am afraid to do these injections once again. The infection was horrible, and I know that my retina is full of scars.
Thank you.
This is a more lighthearted, nostalgic post compared to others but it made me grin. So, last week I was gaming with my highschool age brother, (I am a junior in college) and he told me at school an annoying girl asked if she could have his spot (they have assigned seating) so that she could sit and talk with her friends. He told her no and to go back to her seat. She started loudly complaining and told the teacher my brother was being unfair because she had poor eyesight and needed to sit closer. The teacher, not wanting to cause a problem obliged and my brother got sent to the back of the class. She spent the whole time talking with her friends and causing a lot of disturbances. This pissed me off a lot considering how incredibly bad my brother's eyesight actually is and that she lied and was acting very entitled. I told him a bunch of things he should say if she tried anything again and he said he'd just ask his teacher to feel how thick his glasses are. Luckily, this didn't have to happen because today we were talking and he very smugly told me that they reassigned seating today, and the teacher put the girl at a table with all her friends. My brother thankfully got a spot near the front of the class, and when the teacher finished his seating chart he remarked, "oh, (girls name) you have bad eyesight right? Why don't we move you up here to the front of the class." Perfect karma.
Edit: thank you all! This is my first award and I'm sure he'll be stoked to see this post!
Are there any supplements that help stop progression of Macular Degeneration? I know that Lutein and Zeaxanthin is touted for that. Does anyone here with that condition use it and have you seen any results? Thanks!
I've been to the eye doctor twice and told them about my symptoms such as ghosting, that is sometimes very bad and visual snow. They did a bunch of test for over an hour both times and said that my eyes are super healthy. I've also been to an optometrist and a regular doctor and told them about my symptoms, and they too didn't seem to be worried, because my eyes are healthy. I saw a post on here of a person saying that they thought they had VSS, but it turned out to be macular degeneration. Is it possible for an eye doctor to miss it?
I'm 20 years old with both eyes being -10 diopters. I saw a graph says 40 percent risk of MMD with -10D which I will lose central vision and might possibly go blind. Is it true? Is the risk of MMD 40% for people with high myopia at -10? I'm still young but I saw a lot of post people at their 30s got MMD and is very scary to me.
Having high myopia, I realize I have a higher chance of developing retinal diseases like myopic macular degeneration. I realize there are no current treatments for MMD, but do you see treatments happening in the future (ie. stem cells regenerating retinal cells, artificial retinas etc).
Anyone familiar with this? I was told from my eye doctor as a kid my eyes would only worsen and never get better. I accepted that. Im 31 now and without my contacts or glasses everything is blurry regardless if its close or far away. Is there anything I could do to fix this? Figured its worth and ask since its 2021 and we have advanced medically alot since then. I know my dad had it too and in his later years he couldnt see anything even with his glasses.
grabbed headline from article: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20211206005105/en/
which cited this study: https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciimmunol.abi4493
Too tired to read, and also too daft at science to understand.
Did this study actually establish that multiple inflammasomes combine to form MS?
summary at top of article:
- Research published Friday in Science Immunology shows the NLRC4 inflammasome, previously thought to be important only for bacteria recognition, combines with NLRP3 to form a dual inflammasome within the cell, triggering inflammation that causes lupus and macular degeneration.
- Blocking the formation of these inflammasomes is effective in preventing disease in animal models of macular degeneration and reducing the production of disease-causing inflammatory cytokines in the blood of patients with lupus.
https://preview.redd.it/iek6s3tc9e181.jpg?width=602&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f40a1a2618ff737245241b409ee0064dcf845b78
Age-related macular degeneration (AMD), is a type of central vision distortion caused by damage to the macular tissue located in the retina at the back of the eye. When central vision is functioning correctly, it is easy to read, drive and identify faces. When this area begins to lose visual clarity, it’s like applying petroleum jelly to the center of the eye, causing distortion in the middle of the field of vision.
AMD is divided into two types: wet (exudative) and dry (atrophic). Dry AMD is the more common form of AMD, occurs in about 85–90% of the AMD population. Dry AMD is less serious than wet AMD. Wet AMD is defined by the appearance of new blood vessels under the retina. These new blood vessels tend to be weak and cause fluid or blood leakage, which can distort vision and lead to retinal damage.1
AMD is caused by the buildup of a yellowish deposit called drusen, a fatty protein. Drusen build-up occurs because nutrients are not getting to the eye and waste is not being removed efficiently. Drusen causes a thinning of the macula (the part of the retina located in the back of the eye) due to a lack of oxygen to nourish the eye. The macula is responsible for central vision.
An individual can have dry AMD in one eye and wet AMD in the other eye. Approximately 10% of the population with dry AMD later develops wet AMD.
Currently, Western medicine does not have a cure for either wet or dry AMD. Western medicine addresses wet AMD with injections of Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor Inhibitor (VEGF) into the eye. Current VEGF drugs are Avastin, Lucentis, and less commonly, Eylea.1 These drugs bind to VEGF causing it to stop producing blood vessels. Injections are usually a temporary solution and requires multiple injections.1 “An average of seven injections will be required the first year…..and treatment is unlikely to be effective in advanced exudative AMD”.1 “The anti-VEGF drugs only treat the exudative component”.1 Some of these drugs were not initially developed to treat macular degeneration. “Avastin was intended to be given intravenously as an anti-cancer drug”.1
VEGF is a protein in the body which stimulates increased growth of blood vessels. Blood vessels are the result of a lack of oxygen to the eye. VEGF is tasked with getting more blood vessels
... keep reading on reddit ➡The dry eye is getting worse. I go to get a shot in my wet eye every month. my mother went completely blind by age 80 from wet macular degeneration, and I smoked for 35 years prior to quitting. my dry eye is now getting worse, but the doctor refuses to do a shot in that eye too because its only “dry” but I’m almost 100% sure the dry will just turn to wet at some point and then it will be too late. Why can’t I have a shot in my dry eye for preventative measures?
Hello,
My 94-year-old grandmother has age-related macular degeneration and reading regular-print paper books has become very difficult for her, which is very depressing for her as reading is her favourite activity (especially during the pandemic, when she rarely gets to see other people). I would like to get her an e-reader so she can continue to read as long as possible. My requirements are:
-
Text as big as possible
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As large a screen as possible
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As easy to use as possible for reading books and magazines (at 94, she's not exactly a tech wizard)
Does this community have any recommendations? I have seen that the Kindle Paperwhite is a good choice but the screen is so small that at font sizes large enough to read you really get like half a paragraph at a time, which I think she would find frustrating (I use a Paperwhite and prefer to read without my glasses [I am fairly nearsighted] and even for me it's annoying to have to turn the page so often]). It seems like the biggest e-reader screen available is the Kobo Elipsa, but I worry it might be overly complicated for her.
Thank you very much for any advice you're able to provide!
https://www.pnas.org/content/118/41/e2102975118
A month or two back, I one day noticed that I had been closing my right eye while reading. Then I wondered why I was doing so. I began to cover my right eye (good eye,) and test reading and seeing small writing from a far as well as images, it was perfect. Then when I covered my right eye (bad eye,) I noticed my site was almost comically bad, blurred, very difficult to see smaller writing and everything else was blurry. Soon after I decided to get a check up at the opticians, hoping I just needed glasses. After going through the usual can you read this line stuff, the optician asked is I would mind him taking pictures of the back of my eye. Of course I did, then he looked somewhat concerned, then he said to me to look at an image of the back of my right eye at a spot named the macular, there was a white circular mark. He said, something is causing degeneration of my macular and he made an urgent referral to the hospital. Due to the backlog, it could be a month or more until I get seen to have a MRI scan of my eye done. I got a bit of a fright when he said this was an urgent matter, then I asked him, “So, is this mark at the back of my eye common?” He looked at me, a bit reserved and said, no, it’s actually rare for a guy your age. He went on to say that my eyesight all in was perfect especially for a guy my age, but because something has damaged my right eye, that was the only reason I can’t see out of it properly. I left feeling a bit cold, and shocked. What I hoped would just be a glasses prescription turned in to something worse. I got glasses anyway as he said they would help some. So, my question is, does anyone know why macular degeneration is going on with a 30 year old as I have since read it really is mostly an old, old persons disorder, and I’m a little worried that something very serious is going on. Any comments with any ideas why this is happening to my eye would be appreciated. Footnote, I am also an epileptic. Thanks
His eye doctor was really worried on the last appointment about the AMD. From what I've read so far, anti-oxidants can help. What would be the best one? (He already takes AREDS.) I'm also ordering a NAD booster, NAC, and astaxanthin. Any other recommendations? Thanks
The dry eye is getting worse. I go to get a shot in my wet eye every month. my mother went completely blind by age 80 from wet macular degeneration, and I smoked for 35 years prior to quitting.
my dry eye is now getting worse, but the doctor refuses to do a shot in that eye too because its only “dry” but I’m almost 100% sure the dry will just turn to wet at some point and then it will be too late.
Why can’t I have a shot in my dry eye for preventative measures??
