Understanding The Two Types Of Macular Degeneration

Understanding Wet Versus Dry Age-Related Macular Degeneration by Allie Lemco Toren.  CNN.  February 3, 2021.   

Human Brains Differ From Nonhuman Primates In How They Process 'Pitch.'

Human Brains Have Evolved To 'Prefer' Music And Speech by Maria Cohut.  Medical News Today.  June 11, 2019. 

A Simple Way To Impriove A Billion Lives: Eyeglasses

A Simple Way To Improve A Billion Lives:  Eyeglasses by Andrew Jacobs.  The New York Times.  May 5, 2018.

Cataract Surgery May Prolong Your Life

Cataract Surgery May Prolong Your Life by Jane E. Brody.  The New York Times.  December 4, 2017. 

Dressmakers Have Superior Ability To Navigate A 3D World: Stereoscopic Vision

Dressmakers Found To Have Needle-Sharp 3-D Vision.  University of California-Berkeley/Science Daily.  June 14, 2017. 

Half The World's Population (5 Billion People) Will Be Nearsighted by 2050; Significant Number With A Risk Of Going Blind

Half Of The World's Population Will Be Nearsighted by 2050, Experts Say by Susan Perry.  Minnpost.  February 23, 2016. 

Possible Surgical Treatment For The Most Severe Type Of Macular Degeneration Shows Some Promise

Age-Related Blindness Cure Steps Closer With New Stem Cell Trial by James McIntosh.  Medical News Today.  September 29, 2015. 

Time Outdoors Seems Linked To Decreased Risk Of Myopia

The World's Myopia Crisis And Why Children Should Spend More Times Outdoors by Ariana Eunjung Cha

Changes In Smell And Retina May Presage Alzheimer's

Key To Detecting Alzheimer's Early Could Be In The Eye by Shirley Wang.  The Wall Street Journal.  July 13, 2014.

Drug To Treat Sleep Disorder In The Blind

FDA Approves Hetlioz To Treat Sleep Disorder In Blind Individuals by Jaleesa Baulkman.  University Herald.  February 1, 2014.

(1)  This drug is the first to treat the sleep disorder caused by a completely blind person's inability to __________________________________________________.

One Guide Dog: Two Years Training Costing $45,000 To $60,000--And That Is Not The Only Obstacle

Precious Eyes by Paul Sullivan.  The New York Times.  November 7, 2013.

(1)  About ______ percent bred to serve as guide dogs do not make the grade.

(2)  The Urban Institute estimates that ____________ nonprofit groups operate in America, a ______ percent increase in the last decade.

(3)  Guide dog schools, for the most part, rely on __________ to finance daily operations.

(4) The high failure rate for guide dogs results from causes including _______________________.

(5)  Guide dogs failure rates are being addressed by ____________________.

Stroke Results In Inability To See Letters and Numbers And Creative "Mind Trick" To Enable Reading

JHU Cognitive Scientists Devise Alphabets That Allow Subjects To Read Again by Greg Rienzi.  Johns Hopkins University Gazette.  June 1, 2013.

Two fascinating case studies focused on reading and numerical processing in the brain as well as the creativity required to developed neurological work-arounds.

(1)  What was the surprising implication of the relationship between the damage to the basal ganglia and the reading impairment resulting from the stroke?

(2)  These case studies suggest that the brain ____________ numbers and letters from other images.
(3)  The researchers  used behavioral, electrophysiological, functional neuroimaging methods to address address questions concerning the cognitive and neural representations underlying ______________________.

Vision-Related Diseases Are A Hefty Financial Burden

Vision-Related Diseases Are A Hefty Financial Burden by Lindsay Friedman.  USA TODAY.  June 30, 2013.

(1)  The nations annual cost of eye and vision disorders is about ____________ billion with an ________ billion increase since 2007.

(2)  Vision disorders are more costly than chronic illnesses including _______________________.

(3)  The increase in vision-related costs stem from care of ______________ with diseases such as _____________.

(4)  True or False:  The federal government and insurance companies cover most of the spending on vision care.

(5)  The best way to deflect further increases in costs is ________________.

(6)  The National Eye Institute recently received a ______ million cut from its $703 million budget.

(7)  How will the Affordable Care Act aid pediatric vision care?

Specially-Designed Video Game Effectively Treats Lazy Eye In Adults

Video Game Treatment For Lazy Eye Restores 3D Vision by Emily Chung.  CDC News.  April 23, 2013.

Lazy eye, amblyopia, has been thought to be all but untreatable in adults.  To develop a new approach, researchers created video games that can only be played with both eyes.  As a result, the strong eye could not suppress the communication of the weak eye and  the brain.  This suppressed communication is thought to be  the cause of lazy eye.

The Blind Connect Through Technology

New Gadgets Assist the Blind by Te-Ping Chen.  The Wall Street Journal.  October 14, 2012.

There are 285 million visually impaired individuals worldwide according to the World Health Organization.  Increasingly technologies are addressing the problem of keeping these individuals connected and participating in society.  This article relates the efforts of companies like Ocean Blue Software which speaks TV menu listings, on-screen prompts, and schedule listings.  Also important has been the proliferation of smartphones which has been a boon to assistive technology.  An example is an app that will snap photos of menus or box labels and read them aloud.  This relatively new industry has growth potential as the population ages and new uses for unimpaired individuals are developed.