VR Treatment for Lazy Eye 169
1point618 writes "According to an article at the BBC, scientist have found a new way to correct amblyopia, or lazy eye, using a virtual reality system. The system works by giving some stimuli to the good eye, but more important stimuli to the bad eye, making it work harder to get stronger while keeping both eyes in use so as not to produce double vision. Supposedly, the system will do in 1 hour what used to take 400 hours, but I'd stay skeptical of such a claim until there is a peer-reviewed paper out."
0o (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm also curious as to what type of amblyopia this treats. Is the treatment equally effective for lazy eye caused by nearsight, farsight, astygmatism, and strabismus? If so, couldn't this also become a treatment for any of those on their own? I'm slightly nearsighted, and my optomotrist explained it to me as my eyes being too lazy to focus correctly. I wonder if I could just give them a little VR workout every now and then to beef them up...
Is there an eye doctor in the house?
--
"Man Bites Dog
Then Bites Self"
Re:0o (Score:2)
Re:0o (Score:1)
Re:0o (Score:3, Interesting)
1. a bad perscription in both eyes
2. loss of color definition in my left (good) eye
3. inability to wear contacts for extended periods
4. occasional eye twitches in lazy eye when overused
5. inability to use right eye in viewfinders, sights, etc. (have to shoot rifles left handed)
As soon as the treatment was over, I went from 20/20 to loosing my distance vision. I never got back the color response in my left (good) eye. now.
The o
Re:0o (Score:2)
I can see out of my left eye, but only when the right eye is closed. My left (bad) eye also suffers color offset, I can't wear contacts for more than a few hours, I have bad prescriptions now in both eyes, etc etc.
While I can prove nothing, I've doubled the sample size
Re:0o (Score:2)
Not really, there are two post's with the same problems, but they are a "self selecting population" aka if it had worked for you then you would have been less likely to post. The real "sample size" would be everyone that had read the article and used the eye patch. Not simply those who posted a negative response.
However, with a large enough self selecting population you can use the sample size of "everyone that had the procedure" and say something like "If 1,000 people
Re:0o (Score:2)
Re:0o (Score:2, Informative)
Start here [quackwatch.org].
Re:0o (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:0o (Score:2)
Re:0o (Score:1)
Re:0o (Score:2)
Re:0o (Score:1)
Re:0o (Score:3)
Did you get a refund from the first doctor?
It worries me sometimes that with the cost of health care, there is little assurance that there is any quality to it. I've had to go to multiple doctors in the past or have paid doctors to fix something and they either didn't o
Re:Doctors vs Mechanics (Score:2)
No, you're right - it has to be ordered separately [haynes.co.uk].
Re:0o (Score:2)
The complexity defense is a good one. It holds up well against a jury of lay people and even judges with things that they have no experience with like technical things or medical issues.
I'm sure you have read and understand all of the laws of your city, state, nation, and international law. And any ignorance of that in the event that you infract upon one of those will get you off. After all, it takes someone 7 years of formal training, and a fulltime jo
Re:0o (Score:4, Interesting)
But definitely it would be easier to be done at an early age, as after puberty there's really no way to easily create neural pathways to the brain. It's the same reason why it's easy for kids to learn languages, yet more difficult for adults. I'm sure it could assist amblyopia in adults, but it would probably be impossible to cure it.
But if your eyes individually are having problems, then I don't think this treatment would address that. It seems to focus on differences between the eyes, versus any inherent weakness in a single eye individually.
Re:0o (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:0o (Score:1)
Re:0o (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:0o (Score:2)
No, but ever since I watched the Simpsons, I know that a lazy eye can be cured by wearing thick-rimmed glasses for two weeks. Oh, and while you're at it, also rub some medicated salve into your scalp to cure your dry skin and wear clunky shoes to fix your fallen arches.
Re:0o (Score:1)
Re:0o (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:0o (Score:2)
Anyway my right eye is still much more capable than my left. Looking at the same
Re:0o (Score:2)
A lot of people in your situation seem to b
Re:0o (Score:2)
But yeah, the critical thing is getting optical correction at a young age. By age 5-9 (depending on who you consider an authority) there will be irremedial damage to vision, in fusion and tracking, from what I know.
Re:0o (Score:2)
Huh? I think you are confused. That is what you usually do after the operation to shorten the muscle which actually does help amblyopia.
I had the operation when I was nine years old, and it was fairly serious. My daughter had the operations when she was 2, and that was outpatient. Obviously surgical techniques have improved as well, but the fact is that it is not amblyop
Obvious... (Score:1)
You clod! (Score:2, Funny)
Re:You clod! (Score:2)
Warning: Do not stare into laser with remaining eye.
yes (Score:2, Funny)
Yeah, I'd have to see it to believe it.
This is news? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:This is news? (Score:1)
Re:This is news? (Score:1)
Umm so what does this mean? (Score:1, Funny)
Well done! (Score:3, Insightful)
Given the timeframe, I guess it'll be ten years or so before a "blog" or a "podcast" is used to cure something.
Re:Well done! (Score:2)
By their trendy nature, these words go in and out of fashion and marketers like to jump to a new set of words that hasn't built up resistance from their audience yet. The art of selling.
Remember when the term "clicks-n-mortar" was still being used? I suspect "podcasts" and "blogs"
Virtual Reality (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Virtual Reality (Score:1)
Drop and give me twenty!
Count out loud.
I can't heeeeeeeeeeeear you; Maggot!
KFG
Re:Virtual Reality (Score:2)
It's been done. (Score:2)
I would've RTFA... (Score:1)
that's nice (Score:3, Funny)
Re:that's nice (Score:2)
somewhat related company (Score:4, Informative)
Good times for those of us with poor eyesight, and a hankering for wetware.
Anywho, I am not in any way related. Just droppin knowledge.
Re:somewhat related company (Score:1)
Lazy Eyes (Score:1)
Re:Lazy Eyes (Score:2)
Focusing is to do with the lens and the cornea. As far as I am aware there is no way of repairing that fault with exercises.
Lazy eye is caused by the brain essentially cutting out falty information being recieved from one eye and ultimately forgetting about it altogether. Exercises (and originally eyepatches) would force the brain to get it up and running again.
Re:Lazy Eyes (Score:2)
You broke my brain.
Great (Score:1)
I'll keep my eyes peeled.
Much simpler solution from 30 years ago (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Much simpler solution from 30 years ago (Score:2)
Re:Much simpler solution from 30 years ago (Score:1)
As a strabismus sufferer... (Score:5, Interesting)
I've had corrective surgery for my strabismus three times, and each time has made significant improvements, but most of my vision still comes from my one good eye. I'm one of the lucky ones - I have a good null point, so my eyes don't bounce all the time. I can drive just fine.
BTW, the medical term for lazy eye is actually occular nystagmus.
Re:As a strabismus sufferer... (Score:1)
Which leads to my question: Has your overall vision improved?
I'm thinking that, if your brain is using one eye because the other is inferior for whatever reason, then doing anything to use both eyes would decrease your overall quality of your vision. Although, it sounds like that the "bad" eye was being corrected so that your vision would improve,
Re:As a strabismus sufferer... (Score:2)
My vision has improved over the years, but I will never have fantastic depth perception.
Re:As a strabismus sufferer... (Score:2)
I don't think that's right. There are different, subjective ways to characterize a "lazy eye," but amblyopia is what "lazy eye" means to optometrists. At least, this is what my last optometrist told me.
Also, Wikipedia's entry for "lazy eye" [wikipedia.org] goes to amblyopia.
Re:As a strabismus sufferer... (Score:1)
this is why am good at shooting left or right handed.. i just focus for a min and now that eye is the dominant one.
it is quite annoying when they randomly switch on their own
Re:As a strabismus sufferer... (Score:2)
The medical term for lazy eye is Amblyopia [preventblindness.org]. Ocular nystagmus is an involuntary twitching of the eye (IANAD, but my daughter has a related eye condition called Leber's [tsbvi.edu]).
That's not too good (Score:2)
Re:That's not too good (Score:1)
Re:That's not too good (Score:2)
Re:That's not too good (Score:1)
I'm pretty certain in context you meant Jack Thompson [wikipedia.org].
The old method couldn't be much worse (Score:3, Interesting)
Any more direct method that was at all effective couldn't help but be a dramatic improvement over eye patches for hours a day.
The Docs consulted prescribed the usual regimen of eye patches and so on for my daughter as a quite young child. I can say from experience that it's not easy to get a child of that age -- and treatment when young was strongly preferable -- to live with the patch. Even when she wasn't particularly annoyed by it, we were dealing with something on the level of brushing your teeth in a little kid. My parenting skills weren't up to the task, and our treatment was hit and miss.
Eventually my daughter's lazy eye has come around by itself, more or less. I'd much rather have been able to intervene with a more active measure, though.
Younger Patients Only.. (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Younger Patients Only.. (Score:2)
until there is a peer-reviewed paper out (Score:1)
I'm going to hold out for the report that rebunks *that* paper in another 5 years or so.
Not new.. (Score:1, Funny)
I've been doing this for years...
On a night out, I keep one eye on my girlfriend's eyes, and another one scans the room...
Re:Not new.. (Score:1)
While we're on it, I get practice by keeping one eye on my mountain dew can, and the other watching to see when gentoo finishes installing...
preference for peer review... (Score:2)
I think you're demanding the unreasonable. It's a pain in the ass to peer when you have lazy eye.
Making the treatment sweeter (Score:2, Insightful)
What I find interesting about this is the concept of treatment delivered through a game. Its damm annoying to have to have one eye covered by a patch, and with too many of your mates saying "ah-hahaha" and singing sea shanties, its not really so much fun either. It seems to deliver the treatment in a much more palatable fashion, and so more effective.
VR? Bah! Pong!!! (Score:3, Funny)
Lazy eye?? (Score:2)
Isn't that what causes dupes on slashdot?? There's a cure now??
First hand experience. (Score:4, Interesting)
It's really a weird condition. I can force myself to see out of my lazy eye but normally I don't. For example when I read I only see the words in my good eye and if I try to read with my lazy eye it's like I can see the words but can't recognize them. Weird. The last time I took an eye exam to renew my driver's license they had one of those machines that shows different letters to each eye. I read off the line I saw and the officer asked "Are you blind in one eye?" I said "No, why" and he said "Because you read every other letter." I didn't even see the letters being shown to my lazy eye.
Re:First hand experience. (Score:3, Informative)
I must take issue with this, lest someone see it and stop trying for their
6-year-old. It is not nearly as easy to treat amblyopia at ages greater than
5, but it is definitely possible.
I had amblyopia and it was not caught until I was 8. I had the operation, and
did years of therapy. It did correc
Me, too... (Score:2)
When I was 20, I couldn't read with my left eye closed. Now (at 30), I can. Depth perception is a useful tool folks - don't give up on it without a fight!
skeptical and lazy (Score:2, Informative)
Left eye, right eye (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Left eye, right eye (Score:2)
Re:Left eye, right eye (Score:1)
Tommy Lee Jones gies you the way to correct this
1. put panties on your head covering the eye you do not want to be dominant.
2. Over other place a periscope
3. now get in Jeep
4. Drive around like this until you drive normally
Re:Left eye, right eye (Score:2)
It's not quick, but practice can fix this. Switch your primary focus from one eye to the other. Objects at different depths are good for this. After a while you'll find that you can switch almost instantly (say, half a second either way) and maintain which eye is primary at will. It's the same thing that's required to switch which hand your write with, or which foot you kick with.
Re:Left eye, right eye (Score:2)
I'm right handed and left eyed as well. Not to many people know their "eye-edness".
I was told that hitting a baseball is the only advantage to being cross hand-eye dominant. Makes sense.
The real funny thing is that I'm about as good at darts with my eyes closed as with them open. Try it, you'll be surprised. The dart board never moves, so visi
Re:Left eye, right eye (Score:2)
Aye, me too, and it's because of corrective measures when I was a small child. Born cross-eyed and various kinds of blurry, they patched and put drops in my over-dominant right eye. I sometimes wonder if I told them when to stop, and no-one listened.
Now my left eye is dominant, but reverts if I'm really tired, which makes for some interesting vision. The worst is trying to play pool: my chin just ge
Re:Left eye, right eye (Score:2)
- Go outside
- Find a light pole or other large ovject at least fifteen or twenty feet away.
- With both eyes open, extend your arm so your thumb is on the object... hold it there
- Now shut right eye and keep left open, then shut left eye and keep right eye open.
- The single eye still showing your thumb over the object is your dominant eye. The non-dominant eye will show your thumb next to the object.
This is why cross-dominance
I've got it (Score:2, Insightful)
So anyway, rad - I'm
Re:I've got it (Score:1)
You're never too old... (Score:2)
I still have problems with one eye drifting, especially when I'm tired, but I now have stereo vision more often than not. It's pretty cool, actually.
Well done ;) (Score:3, Funny)
And that my friends is a professional
I knew video games were good for something (Score:1)
I'm doubly-lazy! (Score:3, Interesting)
I can, at will, cause either one of my eyes to break convergence and look somewhere else and then alternate which eye is lazy by "looking" out the other eye. That "lazy" eye will then start looking outward and I'll get double vision, but how noticable it is depends on how out-of-whack my eye convergence is (I can also control how much convergence I loose, so I can go from slight, almost overlapping double vision, to nearly completely different viewpoints). If I'm looking at something to the extreme right or left I usually end up looking with just one eye, but I don't notice the double-vision for some reason. I've since learned to physically turn my head / body towards what I'm looking at since that makes it physically possible for me to look at something with both eyes. Another trick I use is to look at something with my "outside eye" (i.e. if I'm looking at something to my right, I will look at it with my left eye, visa-versa if looking left). I'm not sure if that makes sense to anyone, but AFAIK, most people should be able to "look" through either of their eyes at will. Over time, I've managed to adapt my behaviour so that most of the time these symptoms don't occur.
The most dangerous downsides to all this is that when I get extremely tired, or very drunk, I can no longer keep my eyes converged and normal vision becomes impossible. Nothing short of intensely focusing on a high-contrast area (say, the sharp edge of a table) will bring convergence back. However, I'm not sure if this happens because of my lazy eyes, or if it happens to other people. Driving while tired is extremely dangerous for me, especially at night, since I loose all sense of depth perception when I get double-vision and I suddenly have no idea which lane I'm in or where I'm headed.
One interesting aspect about all this is that if I cover one eye then I can no longer get this behaviour to happen, which has saved me a few times during extremely boring lectures! Something about looking with both eyes causes the trouble.
Re:I'm doubly-lazy! (Score:2)
Dupe! (Score:4, Funny)
Err, never mind..
nice to have hope! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:0o (Score:2, Informative)
---
I'm a neurologist, not an ophthalmologist, but perhaps I can help...
Amblyopia is a defect in the processing of visual spatial information that affects the visual pathways in the brain NOT the eye. It is developmental in that there is some problem in an eye from an early age that prevents proper binocular vision, for example a congenital cataract, or a problem aligning the two eyes, i.e,. weak muscles or strabismus.
What is thought to happen is that the brain's v
The end result? (Score:2)
-matthew
My optometrist tells me otherwise (Score:2)
Not surprising (Score:2)
Re:I have a form of that (Score:1, Funny)
I've heard of this; it's a condition known in academic circles as "drunk."
I was one of teh developers (Score:1)
Re:I have a form of that (Score:1)