Early Macular Degeneration, best lenses
My grandmother over the past few years has had her vision deteriate to next to nothing due to macular degeneration. Then a few weeks ago my mothers exam they informed her she's in the early stages of the disease.
She's received her new prescription and asked me if there where any particular lenses she might get that helps minimize further damage.
Anyone have any words of advice?
When the final chapter is written....
When the final chapter is written on age related macular degeneration, I think the culprit is going to be identified as Ultra violet radiation. Your mothers lenses should have a UV filter. I am seeing dietary and vitamin therapy proscribed. It turns out that our grandmothers were right all along with "eat your carrots-brocolli etc"
In the beginning stages she is probably hardly aware of it. It is by definition, a degenerative disease. It doesn't get better, and any sight loss can't be restored, but it may not get significantly worse either.
Macular Degeneration is the loss of the central portion of vision. This is the part we use when we read. The peripheral vision is still good so the name of the game is to use magnification so that the unaffected periphery can be used. If you have a low vision person in your area, you can have her vision evaluated, and if necessary she can be given magnifiers which for the most part will solve her compromised reading.
I approach low vision on a task oriented basis. She will identify the task (s) she is having difficulty with, and you look for the vision aid that will solve the problem. If you have difficulty finding a low vision specialist, email me and I'll tell you a couple of ways to go about finding one.
You can take some comfort in the fact that there is an entire industry working on this problem and new solutions are coming out all the time.
hj
Another thing I forgot....
Folks with AMD usually see some colors better than others. I have an electronic magnifier which can produce yellow on blue, green on black, yellow on black and white on black as well as 2 shades of black on white.
Corning makes a clip on kit, marketed by Eshenbach which has different tints allowing the wearer to percieve colors differently.
My experience is that this can be a random thing, that is, you can't predict which colors are better ahead of time. Each individual is different......You will have to rely on someone else to explain why....that's not my area but I would love to know the answer to that myself.
hj