Low Vision/Geriatrics News

An intensified national push to find new approaches aimed at preventing Alzheimer’s disease has prompted $45 million in new clinical trial and translational research awards.

Noninvasive diagnostic retinal testing could possibly hold the answer to early Alzheimer’s disease detection and treatment. The PRIMARY CARE OPTOMETRY NEWS August cover story details how retinal testing may detect amyloid beta protein deposits, the biomarker of Alzheimer’s disease.

Be it a family member, friend, neighbor or even acquaintance, it seems most everyone knows someone afflicted by Alzheimer’s disease. Witnessing the cognitive, behavioral and associated physical decline is enough to strike fear in the hearts of all involved. Perhaps what is most unsettling about Alzheimer’s is our lack of effective treatment.

Abnormalities of latency and latency-accuracy-speed variability reflected deficits of cerebral areas involved in the triggering and execution of vertical saccades in patients with Alzheimer’s disease and amnestic mild cognitive impairment, according to a recent study.

Presently, diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease begins with symptoms patients exhibit, namely memory loss. Unfortunately, by the time patients become symptomatic, the disease has already progressed to its later stages. Like age-related macular degeneration, treating Alzheimer’s disease at such an advanced stage is difficult, if not altogether impossible. However, recent advances in Alzheimer’s research have yielded the potential for a method of detecting the disease in its developmental stages, possibly decades before patients become symptomatic.

The SightScope Flip by Ocutech allows a wide field of view, line-of-sight adjustment and the option of flipping it up and above the spectacles on which it is mounted when magnification is not needed.

To the Editor:

To the Editor:

Eye movement behavior and certain spatial properties that have adapted to vision loss may be evidence of the plasticity of the visual system, even late in life, according to the American Academy of Optometry’s 2012 Glenn A. Fry award winner. This suggests that it may be feasible to improve visual function of people with central vision loss through perceptual learning, she said.

As long as there have been elderly, visually impaired drivers, optometrists have wrestled over the balance between protecting themselves from legal action and protecting the well-being of their patients and of those with whom their patients share the road.