Woman who lost vision to diabetes shares experience to raise awareness
It was Labor Day 2015 when Rosetta Ivey-Foster, a 76-year-old retired bank clerk, learned first-hand how quickly diabetes can deteriorate vision. Swift action restored most of her eyesight. Diagnosed with type 1 diabetes more than 25 years ago, Ivey-Foster had carefully managed her disease. That included getting regular comprehensive dilated eye exams to detect early… Read More
Zika and glaucoma linked for first time in new study
A team of researchers in Brazil and at the Yale School of Public Health has published the first report demonstrating that the Zika virus can cause glaucoma in infants who were exposed to the virus during gestation. Exposure to the Zika virus during pregnancy causes birth defects of the central nervous system, including microcephaly. Brazilian… Read More
Brain training video games help low-vision kids see better
A new study by vision scientists at the University of Rochester and Vanderbilt University found that children with poor vision see vast improvement in their peripheral vision after only eight hours of training via kid-friendly video games. Most surprising to the scientists was the range of visual gains the children made, and that the gains… Read More
The importance of being protected: How to choose your sunglasses
Experts from the University of Alicante (UA) have found that prolonged exposure to the sun increases the chance of developing alterations in the lens by 4%. Choosing the right pair of sunglasses can reduce such complications. Despite the fact that the vast majority of the harmful radiation from the sun is absorbed by the atmosphere,… Read More
New test needed to assess the quality, safety of sunglasses
Revision of standards is needed to test sunglasses quality and establish safe limits for the lenses’ UV filters, according to research published in the open access journal Biomedical Engineering OnLine. Exposure to the sun may deteriorate your sunglasses over time and the lenses may become lighter and so alter the category under which they are… Read More
Artificial retinas: Promising leads towards clearer vision
A major therapeutic challenge, the retinal prostheses that have been under development during the past ten years can enable some blind subjects to perceive light signals, but the image thus restored is still far from being clear. By comparing in rodents the activity of the visual cortex generated artificially by implants against that produced by… Read More
Surprise discovery in the blink of an eye
We probably do it every day, but scientists have only just discovered a distinct new way in which we move our eyes. The team from the University of Tübingen in Germany assessed the eye movements of 11 subjects using tiny wires attached to the cornea and with infrared video tracking. In results published in eLife,… Read More
June 2016 is Fireworks Eye Safety Month
PCVI and many other eye health providers support the sound warnings regarding firework eye safety. With the Fourth of July only a matter of weeks away, it’s important to review reminders that can serve as a real protection. According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, fireworks are involved in thousands of injuries treated in… Read More
Visual acuity
Visual acuity (VA) is acuteness or clearness of vision, especially form vision, which is dependent on the sharpness of the retinal focus within the eye, the sensitivity of the nervous elements, and the interpretative faculty of the brain. VA is a quantitative measure of the ability to identify black symbols on a white background at… Read More
Our brain suppresses perception related to heartbeat, for our own good
Our heart is constantly beating yet we normally do not feel it. It turns out that our brain is capable of filtering out the cardiac sensation so that it doesn’t interfere with the brain’s ability to perceive external sensations. For the first time, researchers from the Center for Neuroprosthetics at EPFL have identified this mechanism…. Read More
