The Debate Goes On

He says there has been a great deal of debate about the effects of screens on children’s eyes, and the Computer Vision Syndrome caused when screens are watched for too long, which is said to cause poor eye-teaming, eye fatigue, blurred vision and dry eyes. 

However, Rodney says other factors are now entering the discussion as eye experts become increasingly aware of the growing impact on vision caused by technology and lifestyle, in some cases as a result of studies-based experience during Covid-19 lockdowns. 

Far Beyond Fatigue

These have led to suggestions that long spells of screen watching at one focal distance could adversely impact on children’s distance and peripheral vision (side vision) as well as their depth and perceptual vision skills, and affect their understanding of what they are seeing; and it might even contribute to the epidemic levels of myopia (shortsightedness) currently affecting one in three people globally.

He says this is supported by researchers studying myopia (nearsightedness), and its growth to epidemic levels along with the speedy growth of technology, close work, and urbanisation, which has resulted in largely indoor and screen-dominated lifestyles. 

“Taking children’s natural tendency to mimic their parents’ habits into consideration, many of these researchers are increasingly focusing on this type of lifestyle when looking for a cause for myopia, instead of focusing entirely on parental genes. And their move in this direction has, in turn, been supported by studies showing a significant growth in myopia during lockdowns, particularly in young children,” Rodney says.

Cutting the Connection with Learning

According to Rodney, while technology, and specially screens, provide quick access to knowledge, and even faster answers, there is no real connection created between the viewer and the information or two-dimensional image on the screen. Nor is there a tangible one with the computer that delivers it. And as quickly as it is delivered, it can be deleted from the screen, and even from the viewer’s memory. 

This lack of connection or engagement can impact considerably on children’s perceptual vision, the skill that enables them to understand what they are seeing on the screen, and its relevance in their lives. It can also lead to a loss of curiosity about knowledge, and shorter attention spans when it comes to learning. 

“Studies have shown that children learn best when engaged on a person- to-person basis, whether that’s with a parent or a teacher. Perhaps it’s a throwback to a time long ago, when most children learned from their parents about how to function, behave, and survive in the real world, and learning was, more often than not, the result of demonstration, participation, observation, and practicality,” Rodney says.

HEAR: Ultra106.5FM Interview with Gary Rodney – Covid and Myopia: What you need to know!

For more information on myopia treatment and management, as well as to learn about vision therapy, or to book an appointment for a visual perception test online, visit the Smart Vision website: Optometrists Sydney: Optometry Services For Children and Adults | Smart Vision; for specific information about Myopia treatment and prevention visit Myopia Prevention: Solutions, Control And Treatment In Sydney; and for detailed information about Myopia Treatment visit Orthokeratology In Sydney: The Non Surgical Alternative.

To book an appointment for a thorough eye check-up, click here or Call the Bondi clinic on (02) 9365 5047 or the Mosman clinic on (02) 9969 1600.

Syndicated by Baxton Media, The Market Influencers, Your Digital Marketing Agency.

He says: “Those who want their car to run well, will ensure the right fuel and oil is used so all its systems work smoothly. It makes sense that eyes, the organs which provide 80% of the information which shapes and guides people’s lives and how they see the world, should be given the same treatment.”

Lessening the Worst of the Worst

According to Rodney, research has shown that the wrong food can impact on vision in general, and also play a role in the development or worsening of chronic eye diseases.  On the contrary, an eye-friendly diet keeps the eyes healthier, lessens the likelihood of eye problems, slows the progression of chronic eye conditions, and lowers the risk of vision loss.

He says an eye health diet is vital when it comes to the top four vision destroyers. These include the eye-clouding cataract; age-related macular degeneration that blurs central vision; diabetic retinopathy which impacts on the retina’s blood vessels; and glaucoma, the world’s largest cause of blindness in those over 60. This eye disease which affects around 76 million people globally, raises the pressure levels in the eyes and damages the optic nerve responsible for conducting visual data from the eyes to the brain.

Eating the Way to Healthier Vision

Rodney says an eye-healthy diet should not include highly processed foods, frequent take-outs and fast-foods like burgers, milkshakes, pre-packed dinners, as well as carbohydrates, fried foods and margarine, which can clog the thin arteries supplying blood to the eyes.

Diabetics, or those who are insulin resistant, should keep clear of sugar to lower the chances of diabetic retinopathy, or slow its progression if already present. Carbonated drinks, and specially those sweetened with corn syrup, are also not recommended, as they can increase blood pressure, which can lead to vision problems. 

Using What’s Good in the Food

On the other hand, a diet which is low in fat, sugar and chemicals, but rich in fruits and vegetables can help protect the eyes’ health, says Rodney, and certain vitamins and minerals have long been seen to support eye health.

Among these stalwarts is Vitamin A, which keeps the eye’s light-sensing cells, used in the harvesting of visual information, in shape. It’s found in orange vegetables and fruits such as carrots, sweet potatoes, apricots and cantaloupes.

Studies also suggest the Vitamin C in oranges, lemons, grapefruit, strawberries,  blackberries, raspberries, bell peppers and tomatoes; and the Vitamin E from avocados, almonds and sunflower seeds and nuts may, at the very least, slow age-related macular degeneration and cataract, and protect the eyes from  environmental problems, smoking, and over-consumption of processed food and take-outs.

So will the two anti-oxidants, lutein and zeaxanthin, found in leafy green vegetables such as kale, spinach, romaine lettuce, turnip greens, peas and broccoli and in eggs;  and the zinc in chickpeas, beans, oysters, lean beef and yogurt.

Omega-3s have been associated with a reduction in the risk of diabetic retinopathy in older adults, and it’s also being investigated with regard to helping with dry eyes. Omega-3s are found in oily fish such as salmon, sardines and tuna, as well as in nuts.

NOTE: Rodney says any eye-health diets should be discussed with eye doctors, whether they’re for coping with severe and sight-threatening diseases, or for improving general eye health and sight. This is important as some supplements or vitamins will only show positive effects if there is a deficiency in them. 

For more information on eye health, its treatment and management, or to make an appointment, visit the Smart Vision website: Optometrists Sydney: Optometry Services For Children and Adults | Smart Vision; for specific information about Myopia treatment and prevention visit Myopia Prevention: Solutions, Control And Treatment In Sydney; and for detailed information about Myopia Treatment visit Orthokeratology In Sydney: The Non Surgical Alternative.

To book an appointment for a thorough eye check-up, click here or Call the Bondi clinic on (02) 9365 5047 or the Mosman clinic on (02) 9969 1600.

Syndicated by Baxton Media, The Market Influencers, Your Digital Marketing Agency.

Tiny Tiles Placed on Brain Surface

The device, a world-first designed to stimulate parts of the brain which are not functioning properly, forms part of the Gennaris bionic vision system developed by the Monash Vision Group’s Cortical Frontiers project. It’s made up of custom-made headgear complete with its own camera and wireless transmitter as well as a vision processor unit powered by software, which are connected to a set of tiny (9x9mm) electronic tiles which are at the core of the wireless system. These tiles are designed to be implanted on the brain’s surface at points where the transmission of information between the retina and the brain’s vision centre is compromised, and could therefore be responsible for the vision loss.

The system operates in a similar way to that of the visual system. The headgear’s video camera takes pictures of the scene around the wearer, and the pictures taken are then sent on to the vision processor, where the most important information is extracted, and transmitted as data to the complex circuitry in the electronic tiles. There it is processed again, this time in order to turn the data sent to it into a pattern of electrical pulses which are used to stimulate the brain through fine microelectrodes. 

New System Aimed at More than Vision

Reacting to this new development in eye and vision treatments and sight renewal, Australian master of optometry and vision therapy expert, Gary Rodney, welcomed this as a move forward in vision treatment that goes beyond focusing entirely on the eyes, and digs deeper into the treatment of vision problems in the processing part of the central visual system. He said this was especially welcome as it could perhaps bring about what’s often seen as the impossible, by returning sight to those without it.

System May Broaden its Usage to Other Areas

Rodney said vision therapy, operating on a different level, had already shown success with eye training in addressing issues which might be seen as unrelated to vision, such as the inability of a child with cerebral palsy to get out of her wheelchair and stand alone, which was accomplished by addressing an eye-tracking problem with vision therapy.

Already the Gennaris researchers have indicated the bionic system’s usage may ultimately not be restricted to correcting blindness, but also for treating those suffering from other neurological conditions which are currently considered hard to treat, or untreatable, such a limb paralysis, epilepsy, spinal cord injury, depression, and the restoration of other vital senses.

For more information on vision therapy, vision testing and other eye conditions, or to make an appointment, visit the Smart Vision website: Optometrists Sydney: Optometry Services For Children and Adults | Smart Vision; for specific information about Myopia treatment and prevention visit Myopia Prevention: Solutions, Control And Treatment In Sydney; and for detailed information about Myopia Treatment visit Orthokeratology In Sydney: The Non Surgical Alternative.

To book an appointment for a thorough eye check-up, click here or Call the Bondi clinic on (02) 9365 5047 or the Mosman clinic on (02) 9969 1600.

Syndicated by Baxton Media, The Market Influencers, Your Digital Marketing Agency.

Why It’s Important to Contain the Surge of Myopia

Rodney says that the effects of the refractive error stretch far further than how it influences vision by causing myopics to see everything close by clearly but anything further away as a blur. It affects and worsens other eye dysfunctions, and impairments like cataracts, non-age-related macular degeneration, glaucoma and retinal detachment, and it can also impact on the emotional, functional, learning and social aspects of the lives of those who have it, as well as their self-image, and ability to feel that they fit into a world they can’t see properly. 

Passed-on Lifestyle Habits Could be at Core of a Spiking Myopiademic

According to Rodney, studies that show children born to myopic parents are more likely to also be myopic, (three times more likely if only one parent is myopic, and six times more if both are) have long attributed this to a variety of genes. However, Rodney says researchers and eye doctors are currently shifting their focus towards the possibility that the parent-child increase in myopic risk might have less (or nothing) to do with genes after all.

The catalyst may instead be entrenched in the passing down, generation after generation, of the family lifestyle to young children who, in learning about their new world, tend to copy their parents’ lifestyle patterns as if these are the blueprint of life. And, Rodney says, if the family has lived in or around a city for generations, the “blueprint” passed on in terms of family history will be that of the second biggest threat in terms of prolonging the epidemic, the urban lifestyle. This way of life involves confined indoor-living in which too little time is spent exercising, or outdoors under natural light; and too much is spent in front of screens in small areas lit by artificial light, all of which have been identified as increasing the onset, and speeding up the progression of myopia.

How Myopia Could Take Over the World’s Vision

Myopia has been increasing its prevalence at a fast rate since the 1970s when under a million people were myopic. Currently it’s believed to be affecting nearly 3billion people, or one third of the world population, and projections suggest it could rise to impacting on one out of two (or around 5 billion) people by 2050.

“ The current myopia epidemic has been running up the graph fairly closely in sync with a similar but slightly faster surge in urbanisation, which is projected to reach a point by 2050 where two out of three of the global population will be living urban lifestyles,” Rodney says.

What concerns him is that this could lead to an even more blurry future in the decades that follow 2050, perhaps even leading to a world in which almost everyone could be subject to low myopia, at the very least. And where a far bigger share of those myopics than the 10% (up from 2,2 % 50 years ago) projected for the more severe levels of high or pathological myopia in 2050, may become a very harsh reality.

These statistics and projections may seem trivial with regard to the prevalence of myopia down the line, Rodney says, when the intrinsic risks to children of being born to myopic parents are taken into account. This suggests that everybody could be at risk of being affected by myopia because in a world half populated by myopics, at least one parent (and probably both) of every child born in the second half of the century, would be likely to be myopic. And this could start an endless vicious circle which could propel myopia still further and faster towards taking over the whole world’s vision.

To learn more about the myopia epidemic, its treatment and management, and more importantly what you can do to prevent it, or to make an appointment, visit the Smart Vision website: Optometrists Sydney: Optometry Services For Children and Adults | Smart Vision; for specific information about Myopia treatment and prevention visit Myopia Prevention: Solutions, Control And Treatment In Sydney; and for detailed information about Myopia Treatment visit Orthokeratology In Sydney: The Non Surgical Alternative.

To book an appointment for a thorough eye check-up, click here or Call the Bondi clinic on (02) 9365 5047 or the Mosman clinic on (02) 9969 1600.

Syndicated by Baxton Media, The Market Influencers, Your Digital Marketing Agency.