COLLEYVILLE, TEXAS – March 6, 2010 – In honor of World Glaucoma Awareness Week (March 7 to March 13, 2010), Total Eye Care will be offering free Glaucoma Screenings on World Glaucoma Day, March 12, 2010 at the Colleyville office located at 6114 Colleyville Blvd. from Noon to 2pm.
“Early detection and awareness are crucial to limiting vision loss from glaucoma. The purpose of Glaucoma Awareness Week is to get the word out and prompt patients to seek an evaluation from their eye doctor. At Total Eye Care we would like to make it easier for patients to learn about glaucoma by offering a free screening ” says Dr. Richard Driscoll, clinical director at Total Eye Care. Glaucoma is the second leading cause of blindness worldwide, not because of lack of effective methods for diagnosis and treatment, but due to insufficient information available to the public and low awareness of the implications of the disease. Glaucoma is asymptomatic in its early stages, while the patient’s vision suffers irreversible and cumulative damage. Visual disturbances are noted by the patient during the later stages on the way to blindness, whereas timely diagnosis and therapy could have prevented this degradation.
“We have so many advanced medications and diagnostic instruments available to us that the detection and treatment of glaucoma has been greatly advanced in the last 10 to 15 years” says Dr. Alycia Green. A glaucoma awareness questionnaire is available on the Total Eye Care website along with detailed handouts for patients on glaucoma and many other eye diseases such as macular degeneration and keratoconus.
Good Morning America reports that the American Academy of Ophthalmology states 90% of patients achieve 20/20 vision following laser vision correction. What the AAO report does not address is that 20/20 does not mean that the patients have a good quality of visual acuity. The Good Morning America Video (video at the end) interviews both satisfied and unsatisfied patients. Some patients complain of a worsening of their dry eye symptoms, halos or shadows, glare or starbursting, poor night vision, reduced contrast or simply uncorrectable blurry vision. The vast majority of the patients that have had LASIK or PRK are happy with the result. However, laser vision correction is not reversible and some of the resultant problems from refractive surgery are not resolvable.
Options available to patients that are not happy with their surgical result, of course depend on the symptom. Some of the options available to patients are:
Post Surgical Contact Lenses
These special contact lenses are available as soft contacts, as gas permeable lenses and as a combination soft/gas permeable. Post refractive surgery contact lenses are usually used when a patients vision can not be corrected by additional surgery, glasses or regular contact lenses because their corneal surface has become slightly irregular or distorted. The symptoms may include, blurry vision, halos and shadows.
Dry Eye Syndrome
The most common complaint following refractive surgery is dry eyes. Most often the dryness improves two to six months following surgery. Ocular dryness can also cause blurry vision. Should the dryness not improve there are numerous solutions to improve patient comfort and it is worth seeking help from an eye doctor that is familiar with treating dry eye syndrome.
Glare and Poor Night Vision
Often glare, halos and night vision problems are due to large pupils and/or uncorrected refractive error. Night driving glasses will usually help patients that are still a little nearsighted following refractive surgery. Treating the glare is little more difficult. Glare often improves with time, however a medication called Alphagan has been known to improve night glare symptoms by causing the pupil to constrict slightly. Alphagan may contribute to the ocular dryness, however.
Know Your Vision Correction Options
LASIK and PRK are good procedures and can greatly improve one’s quality of life. Prior to taking the refractive surgery plunge patients should thoroughly research their options. In an upcoming article I’ll cover the alternatives to refractive surgery.
At Total Eye Care we offer all of the refractive surgery and non surgical vision correction options available and we pride ourselves on giving our patients an objective opinion of all of their choices. It is important for our patients to be well educated on the pros and cons of each option so that they can make an informed decision.
Check out the video below from the Good Morning America’s investigation on LASIK, it offers a balanced report on refractive surgery.
Results from a pilot study conducted by doctors at the New England College of Optometry were recently presented at Optometry’s Meeting and the American Academy of Optometry. In the study, subjects were examined using the methods of traditional ophthalmoscopy and optomap® assisted ophthalmoscopy, where an ultra-widefield retinal image from the Optos P200C guides the BIO fundus examination.
Forty subjects underwent non-mydriatic imaging with the P200C. Subjects were then dilated and underwent traditional ophthalmoscopy and optomap® assisted ophthalmoscopy. The traditional exam consisted of BIO and slit lamp biomicrosopy with precorneal lenses. optomap® assisted ophthalmoscopy was identical to traditional, with the exception that the doctor reviewed optomap® Images before performing their BIO examination. A masked Reader graded the optomap® Images of all subjects. A retinal specialist examined 28 of the 40 subjects and served as the gold standard. Keep reading →
We now have LACRISERT® available in the office for the treatment of dry eye syndrome. So far the results have been promising. LACRISERT® is inserted inside your lower lid once or twice a day. Lacrisert slowly releases supplemental tears to your eyes throughout the day.
Most patients have found that using the LACRISERT® once a day provides sufficient relief for most of the workday. When the LACRISERT® has almost completely disolved it tends to not stay trapped inside the lower lid, causing intermittent blurred vision. A drop of artificial tears flushes out the last remnant restoring vision.
Please feel free to call the office to see if LACRISERT® may be an option for your dry eyes.
It seems that virtually everyone that has experienced a migraine wants to crawl into a dark room. The February 2010 issue of the journal Nature Neuroscience has published a study that explains why this phenomena may occur.
The study links a possible connection between light sensitive retinal nerve cells and nerve cells in the brain that are responsible for the perception of migraine pain. The study noted that blind patients also avoided light when suffering from a migraine, however blind patients that had lost their eye did not avoid light. The authors concluded that some of the retinal axons, included some light sensitive axons were sending signals to the hypothalamus, a part of the brain that is responsible for the perception of headache pain.
Have you ever wondered how soft contact lenses are made? We found this Discovery Channel video from the show How Do they do it? showing how custom soft contact lenses are made.
In December 2009 we covered the results of a recent study Myopia Increasing Rapidly in The US Population. Recently National Public Radio’s Medical Detectives interviewed, Dr Susan Vitale, principle author of the study “1994-2004 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey” and Dr. Don Mutti, an expert in myopia. It’s a good listen and only a little over 3 minutes.
It seems that virtually everyone that has experienced a migraine wants to crawl into a dark room. The February 2010 issue of the journal Nature Neuroscience has published a study that explains why this phenomena may occur.
