February is National AMD/Low Vision Month

The entire month of February is National AMD/Low Vision Awareness Month. In order to understand the seriousness and importance of this awareness please do the following:

Take your left hand and cover your left eye, now make a fist with your right hand. Take your right fist and place it directly in front of your right eye. The only thing you should see is images in your periphery or side vision. Now imagine that this is how you are to function within the world.

I tried this learning technique after reading about actress Jane Seymour's connection with "Don't Lose Sight, a national awareness campaign, aimed at educating Americans about Age-Related Macular Degeneration (AMD), the very disease that has affected her mother's sight for over 20 years.

More than 15 million Americans are affected by AMD and it is the leading cause of visual impairment and legal blindness among people 50 years and older. It progresses painlessly leaving many AMD patients unaware that they have the disease. Age-Related Macular Degeneration primarily destroys the sharp central vision controlled by a spot at the back of the retina called the macula. Sharp central vision is needed to read, drive, identify faces, watch television and perform daily tasks that require straight ahead vision.

AMD does not affect the peripheral vision and will never lead to complete blindness. Degeneration often starts in one eye and progresses into the other eye over some years. There are two forms of AMD-Wet (neovascular) and Dry (atrophic). Dry AMD occurs in 90% of all cases and is the result of thinning retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) and can affect color perception. The wet form affects only 10% of AMD cases and is the more severe of the two. It occurs when delicate abnormal blood vessels form under the retina and begin to leak fluid and blood, causing scarring that leads to loss of sharp vision. Although there are no accepted forms of treatment for Dry AMD, Wet AMD has seen the most progress with more options and medications being developed and researched on a continuous basis

There is no cure for AMD yet promising preventative measures can be taken in the fight against AMD. Significant research findings prove that the nutrients Lutein and Omega 3s are critical to eye health. According to a recent study reported in the Journal of American Medical Association, researcher Johanna Seddon of Harvard University found that an intake of 6mg per day of Lutein decreased the prevalence of AMD by 43%. This and other evidence suggests that nutritional supplements can help one of the risk factors of AMD-inadequate nutrition-other major factors include family history, gender, smoking and ageing. Scientists expect the incidence of AMD to triple by the year 2025 with the growth of the ageing baby boomer generation.

See an eye doctor regularly for early detection of AMD.