When it comes to eye health, the knowledge and technology discovered in the last two decades have led to amazing innovations. Some of these include treatments for diseased eyes, damaged eyes and eyes that are losing function due to getting older. Now, there are excellent diagnostic and therapeutic technologies that can address complicated eye issues, and the results are impressive.
Defining Lazy Eye
Lazy eye or amblyopia is a condition that generally affects one eye, but it can also show up in both. It occurs during childhood at around age five, when nerve pathways between the brain and an eye aren’t correctly stimulated. This leads to a wandering eye and can develop into poor depth perception, decreased vision or even vision loss.
About 3% of children have a lazy eye, but early treatment often delivers very good results.
Eye care experts recommend that every child have a vision screening at least once between the ages of three and five.
Beyond Patching
Treating a lazy eye features some revolutionary methods. Traditional treatment, such as placing a patch over the good eye is still an option, but there are some drawbacks. For one, it can be awkward for a child to wear a patch. Kids want to fit in, and a patch singles them out. Some can feel embarrassed or uncomfortable, so some children don’t wear the patch consistently, and this results in minimal improvement.
These days, you can treat Amblyopia with modern therapies that can yield effective results. One of these methods is known as vision therapy, and according to the experts at the Bowersox Vision Center, this sequence of “eye exercises” is done once per week in sessions lasting 45 minutes.
Vision therapy is not like wearing glasses or having eye surgery. Instead, it focuses on “teaching” the visual system to work more efficiently through a series of supervised exercises. Scientific evidence shows that vision therapy works.
AI And Eye Tracking
In Israel, the CureSight system appears to be another option producing notable results. The therapy works by tracking a child’s eye movements and providing corrective feedback while the child is at home watching a favorite movie or TV show. CureSight utilizes sophisticated real-time, 3D image-processing algorithms.
The pay-off is good, according to one clinical study. In that trial, 20 kids took part, and significant improvement in both visual acuity and stereo-acuity was achieved following 12 weeks of training with a 95% consistency rate.
Bino-Vision Goggles
Children also seem to enjoy wearing these interesting goggles rather than putting on an eye patch. Binocular vision rehabilitation goggles are another newer method of treating a lazy eye condition.
Just recently, NPK SPP, an affiliate of the Russian state corporation Roscosmos, announced plans to test Bino-Vision goggles from 2023 to 2024 to help young people with eye injuries and eye conditions.
In Israel, this technology is already being applied, and children are having fun wearing them. The special goggles have been designed to stream a different presentation of the same image to each eye simultaneously.
BinoVision works with any digital content out there, including cartoons, TV shows, movies, games and music videos, etc.
Here in the United States, bringing Bino-Vision to American kids is on its way. Medisim of Neve Ilan is on the path toward FDA approval of BinoVision video goggles to treat children with amblyopia.
Video Game Play
Playing action video games is another method of treating a lazy eye in those who are 15 and above. A study was conducted on 20 adults with a lazy eye from ages 15 to 61. In my experience, The research discovered that dopamine is released when playing action video games, and that can help with neuroplasticity and could, therefore, promote recovery.
While they were playing video games, participants wore a patch over their good eye, and the experiment yielded a 30% increase in visual acuity.
The research on video game therapy for lazy eye is still in its early stages, and patients shouldn’t attempt to “self-treat” their condition.
There are incredible and exciting ophthalmic developments happening to treat a variety of eye issues. These breakthrough solutions bring much hope to people worldwide.
Robert Michael is an expert in health and lifestyle, and he loves writing about food. He started writing because he cares a lot about overall health. Robert’s health articles are helpful and show his understanding of healing and well-being. He enjoys food and writes about tasty dishes and healthy eating. His lifestyle articles show his belief in a happy, healthy life. Robert writes in a way that is easy to connect with and shows he cares about his topics. This makes his articles very appealing.
