Amblyopia Causes Slow Reading in Children

"Children with amblyopia, commonly known as 'lazy eye,' may have impaired ocular motor function," reports Medical News Today. "This can result in difficulties in activities for which sequential eye movements are important, such as reading. A new study conducted at the Retina Foundation of the Southwest determined that children with amblyopia read more slowly than children with normal vision or with strabismus alone. Their findings are published in the Journal of the American Association for Pediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus (AAPOS)." Read more.

Amblyopia "Drives" Information from the "Good" Eye

"Most often in amblyopia patients, one eye is better at focusing," says Bas Rokers, a University of Wisconsin-Madison psychology professor. "The brain prefers the information from that eye, and pushes down the signal coming from the other, 'lazy' eye. In a way, it's better to think of the better eye as a bully, rather than the poorer eye as lazy." That's the story from a University of Wisconsin press release. As the brain develops its preference for the dominant eye's input, it alters its connections to the weaker eye, according to a study Rokers and colleagues published this week in a special edition of the journal Vision Research. "If you continually have that bullying happening, that changes the signals coming from the lazy eye," Rokers says. "We wondered, if you don't have as many signals traveling back and forth, does that come with a physical change in those passageways?" Using a brain scanning method called diffusion-weighted imaging, the researchers mapped three sets of pathways known to carry visual information from the eyes to the brain. In people with amblyopia, the researchers saw water diffusing more easily down the brain's visual pathways. Read more.

New Scanner Helps Diagnose Amblyopia and Strabismus

A new clinical study published in in JAMA Ophthalmology has identified REBIScan's Pediatric Vision Scanner (PVS) as superior approach to testing preschool children for amblyopia and strabismus. Study author Reed Jost, senior author Dr. Eileen Birch, and their colleagues from the Retina Foundation of the Southwest tested 300 children using the PVS (and also using Welch Allyn's SureSight autorefractor), and then examined the children individually. In an independent study supported by the Thrasher Research Fund, they found that the PVS significantly outperformed the SureSight in sensitivity, identifying 97% of children affected by the targeted conditions, and made significantly fewer unnecessary referrals of healthy children (better specificity). Read more.

Development Has Implication for Treatment of Amblyopia

“A study in mice reveals an elegant circuit within the developing visual system that helps dictate how the eyes connect to the brain,” reports Science Daily. “The research, funded by the National Institutes of Health, has implications for treating amblyopia, a vision disorder that occurs when the brain ignores one eye in favor of the other.” Read more.

Hope Found for Effective Treatment of Amblyopia

"A new discovery by a University of Maryland-led research team offers hope for treating 'lazy eye' and other serious visual problems that are usually permanent unless they are corrected in early childhood," according to Science Digest. "During the so-called "critical period" when a young child's brain is adapting very quickly to new experiences, the brain builds a powerful neural network connecting the stronger eye to the visual cortex. But the weaker eye gets less stimulation and develops fewer synapses, or points of connection between neurons. Over time the brain learns to ignore the weaker eye. Mild forms of amblyopia such as 'lazy eye' result in problems with depth perception. In the most severe form, deprivation amblyopia, a cataract blocks light and starves the eye of visual experiences, significantly altering synaptic development and seriously impairing vision." Read more.

Fixing Amblyopia --in Kittens

"Restoring vision might sometimes be as simple as turning out the lights. That's according to a study reported on February 14 in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, in which researchers examined kittens with a visual impairment known as amblyopia before and after they spent 10 days in complete darkness,” reports Science Daily. “Researchers Kevin Duffy and Donald Mitchell of Dalhousie University in Canada believe that exposure to darkness causes some parts of the visual system to revert to an early stage in development, when there is greater flexibility.” Read more.

New Insights into Lazy Eye

"Little is known about oculomotor function in amblyopia, or 'lazy eye,' despite the special role of eye movements in vision," notes Science Daily. "A group of scientists has discovered that abnormal visual processing and circuitry in the brain have an impact on fixational saccades (FSs), involuntary eye movements that occur during fixation and are important for the maintenance of vision. The results, which raise the question of whether the alterations in FS are the cause or the effect of amblyopia and have implications for amblyopia treatment, are available online in advance of publication in the November issue of Restorative Neurology and Neuroscience." Read more.

Video Games Helps with Treating Amblyopia

MedicalNewsToday reports that "a new study conducted in an eye clinic in India found that correction of amblyopia, also called "lazy eye," can be achieved in many older children, if they stick to a regimen that includes playing video games along with standard amblyopia treatment. At the 115th Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Ophthalmology, Dr. Somen Ghosh reported on the approaches that allowed about a third of his study participants, who were between 10 and 18 years old, to make significant vision gains." Read more.

Blocked Tear Eye Increases Rick of Amblyopia

"A recent study published in the Journal of the AAPOS, the official publication of the American Association for Pediatric Ophthalmology and Strabismus, has found that children under the age of 3 with a nasolacrimal duct obstruction (NLDO), or blocked tear duct, were at an increased risk for developing amblyopia. About 6% of children are born with blocked tear ducts," reports MedicalNewsToday. Read more.

Glasses as Sole Therapy Work with Strabismic & Amblyopia

"Glasses as the sole therapy can improve and even resolve the vision of children with strabismic and combined strabismic-anisometropic amblyopia, according to research published online September 29 in Ophthalmology. The finding should encourage clinicians to consider prescribing glasses until their patients stop improving, before resorting to patches or atropine, first author Susan Cotter, OD, MS, told Medscape Medical News." Read more.

Playing Video Games Decreases Effects of Amblyopia

HealthJockey reports that "amblyopia or lazy eye is a brain disorder in which one eye does not develop properly resulting in an inability to see precisely. A new study conducted by scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, has disclosed that video games apparently help enhance the vision of adults suffering from amblyopia or lazy eye." Read more.

Is 3D Eyewear Dangerous? AAO Says...

MedicalNewsToday reports the following summary of a statement by the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) regarding the use of 3D eyewear:

At this time there are no conclusive studies on the short- and/or long-term effects of 3-D digital products on eye and visual development, health, or function in children, nor are there persuasive, conclusive theories on how 3-D digital products could cause damage in children with healthy eyes. The development of normal 3-D vision in children is stimulated as they use their eyes in day-to-day social and natural environments, and this development is largely complete by age three years.

The AAO did issue precautions about children with amblyopia, strabismus, and focus inhibiting conditions.

Lazy Eye Solved with a Pin Prick

MedicalNewsToday reports that "acupuncture may eventually become another optional treatment apart from patching for lazy eye, also known as amblyopia, especially among older children who have a poorer response to patching, say researchers from China in Archives of Ophthalmology. Approximately 0.3 to 5% of people globally are affected by lazy eye, the authors report as background information."