Lehigh Valley Center For Sight

Cataract Surgery Metabolic changes of the crystalline lens fibers in your eye can lead to opacification and loss of transparency of the lens in the eye over time. This could lead to vision impairment. During cataract surgery, the cloudy natural “cataract” lens in your eye is removed and replaced with a synthetic lens to restore clear vision. Laser Cataract Surgery Laser cataract surgery was first performed in the USA in 2010. Due to the precision, quick turnaround time, consistency and convenience offered by this procedure, it has gained the support of ophthalmic surgeons worldwide. Most laser cataract surgeries take just 15 minutes and since the procedure only requires local anesthesia you will be awake during this procedure. How a laser cataract surgery is performed: The laser-assisted cataract system’s camera analyses your eyes and feeds detailed visuals of your eye lens to a specialized computer. This allows your surgeon to map the eye-lens surfaces and identify the ideal loc...

An important bill has been introduced to the US House of Representatives that has the potential to greatly increase research funding for all blinding eye conditions, including retinal diseases such as retinitis pigmentosa, Leber congenital amaurosis, Usher syndrome, and age-related macular degeneration. We at FFB are asking you to write or call your Member of the House of Representatives to ask them to support H.R. 6421, the Faster Treatments and Cures for Eye Diseases Act.  Co-sponsors of the bill include: Pete Sessions (TX), Sanford Bishop (GA), Fred Upton (MI), and Gus Bilirakis (FL). Visit Find Your Representative to get contact information for your House Member. This legislation, which has bipartisan support, would significantly increase funding for the translational biomedical research that will speed development of treatments and cures for all eye conditions, including inherited retinal diseases, from the lab out to the people and families who desperately need them. The...

There are many elderly Americans who are reluctant to get medical attention for a number of reasons, many of them not justified by the facts. It’s their fears and emotions that may be getting in the way of obtaining needed eye care. If you’re helping an elderly parent or family member and you know they need medical or eye care Houman Ahdieh, MD but they’re reluctant or unwilling to get it, here are some things to think about. Is the person mentally competent? Whether because of some form of dementia, psychological issues or due to the side effects of medications, the person may be incapable of making health care decisions for themselves. If they are seeing physician inform him or her of the problem and try to get their help. Unless you’re the agent on a health care power of attorney or the person has signed a release, the doctor probably won’t tell you much because of privacy issues, but that doesn’t stop you from letting the doctor know what’s going on at home. If you genuinely th...

Many people using eyeglasses or contacts everyday can now receive Lasik surgery. In order to be considered as a good candidate for Lasik surgery there are some rules you will need to abide by. Lasik is FDA-approve d for those 18 and older. Most providers encourage young adults to wait until their mid-20s. Until this time a person’s prescription may be still changing. Having a stable prescription for at least two years is often required as proof before anyone, young or old, is deemed a good Lasik candidate. From the point of stable prescription on, most adults concurrently grow their savings, begin traveling for work and pleasure. Perhaps they start developing an irritation or exhaustion with contacts and eye glasses. This creates the popular period during which most people look at Lasik surgery. Around the age of 40, a person’s eyes start to change. They are usually good candidates for laser surgery. At age 60, the eyes start to change once more. This is when the risk of c...

    This month, February 2018, is age-related macular degeneration month. With the purpose of increasing awareness of this vision-limiting and life-altering disease, here are ten common questions about age-related macular degeneration. Question #1 – What is macular degeneration? Macular degeneration is a degenerative disease which causes damage to the macula, the part of the retina which gives us the clarity and fine-detail of our central vision. Our eyes are like a camera, and the retina is like the film in our cameras, as all the light from our surroundings is focused onto the retina. This information is then sent from our retina to our brain to be interpreted into what we see. The most important area of the retina, with the greatest concentration of light-sensing cells, is the macula, and in macular degeneration, these light-sensing cells become damaged. Macular degeneration is a generic term referring to various degenerative diseases of the macula, but in this video we wil...

3D printing sounds like a concept from a sci-fi movie or an Isaac Asimov novel. It involves creating a physical, three-dimensional object from a digital file. The technology has been used for some time in niche markets, generally for prototyping. However, new breakthroughs are propelling 3D printing into the mainstream, and the technology is poised to cause serious disruptions in manufacturing and healthcare. A recent PricewaterhouseCoopers survey of US manufacturers revealed that two out of three companies have already begun adopting 3D printing, from experimenting with the technology to using it to create final products. The same survey found that about 30% of manufacturers believe widespread adoption of 3D printing will revolutionize supply chains, shrinking them so that end-users get ahold of products faster, and without the need for costly. Some of the most fascinating applications for 3D printing can be found within the healthcare industry. Already, enterprising researchers...

For someone with a retinal disease such as retinitis pigmentosa or macular degeneration, their vision loss is caused by photoreceptor degeneration. Photoreceptors are the retinal cells that capture light and convert it into electrical signals, which are sent back to the brain where they are used to create the images we see. Many research groups from around the world are investigating ways to create new photoreceptors from stem cells for transplantation into the retina for vision restoration. But this approach presents many challenges including risk of immune response to the new photoreceptors, as well as the difficulty in getting them to functionally integrate with the patient’s existing retinal tissue. The delicate surgery often necessary for transplanting the new cells can be risky, as well. However, Thomas Reh , PhD, an FFB-funded expert in retinal development and regeneration at the University of Washington, is working on an innovative approach with the potential to revolutioniz...