Understanding Cataracts
Thousands of people are diagnosed with cataracts every year, but many of them aren’t quite sure what cataracts are, why they got them, or how they can get rid of them. It’s important to understand what something is before you seek out treatment for it. Cataracts are actually a type of macular degeneration. It is estimated that cataracts affect over five and a half million people in the United States, which is why it is actually very important to learn what cataracts are and how they can be fixed. LASIK eye correction is becoming more popular these days.
It’s often easier to understand how the eye works if you liken it to a camera lens. When you take a classic 35mm film camera, you’ve got two main parts: the lens and the body. The lens brings the light into the body, while the body holds the film and imparts the image that was transferred through the light onto the film. This is also how your eye works. With your eyes, the lens and the cornea focus the light and bounce it back onto the retina, which then acts like the body of a camera, transferring the image into your brain through the optic nerve so that you’re able to see.
The lens is behind the iris and the pupil, and when it becomes too cloudy, it is difficult to see. The same is true for your camera – if your camera lens gets fogged up, everything you’re taking a picture of is clouded or fuzzy. The only difference is that with a camera lens, you can clear off the fog, but when your vision gets cloudy, it’s not a quick fix. With macular degeneration, the problem can get worse and worse until the person is left nearly blind.
Clouding
So why does the lens on the eye cloud up? It is because of a protein that is actually found on the eye at all times. Sometimes, especially when a person grows older, this protein is unable to disperse evenly as it needs to, so it forms clumps. It is these clumps that are actually the building blocks of a cataract. The more the clumps grow, the worse the cataracts become, and the more limited the person’s vision is.
Different Types
There are actually three different types of cataracts. The first is known as a subcapsular cataract. This is a common type of cataract for someone who has diabetes or who has a condition known as retinitis pigmentosa, a disorder that causes night blindness. Steroid users are also at high risk for having a subcapsular cataract. A nuclear cataract is what is generally found in elderly people. This is considered, by many ophthalmologists, to be a natural part of aging. And the third part of cataract is a cortical cataract. The main difference between a nuclear cataract and a cortical cataract is that with a nuclear cataract, the cataracts start at the center of the lens, blurring and distorting vision shortly after they begin. With a cortical cataract, the blurring starts on the outer edges, which is why it is not often caught immediately.
Do I Have a Cataract?
So how do you know if you have a cataract and if you need to see a surgeon? With most patients, they first notice that they have a blurring when they’re looking at things. This blurring is similar to what you’d see when you look through lenses that are a bit fogged. A person who has this type of macular degeneration may also find that they have an increased sensitivity to light, or that they’re having a hard time looking at things at night. Many people who suffer from this form of macular degeneration find that colors look almost washed out. you may need to have surgery for cataracts or a restor lens austin replacement.
Prevention
Most elderly people wonder what they can do in order to prevent cataracts from forming. No one, however, knows for sure what causes cataracts to form. There are some beliefs in the medical community that ultraviolet light contributes to the disease, which is why most ophthalmologists will recommend using sunglass while you’re outdoors. And some also believe that things like alcohol use and cigarette smoke is attributed to cataracts.
Treatment
So once you’ve got cataracts, how can they be treated? Some find that glasses and bifocals help them to be able to see better, but many people are looking to cataract surgery to help them to get
Side Effects
There are few side effects that you have to worry about when you have this procedure, and those side effects are very rare. Some problems include corneal edema, which is a swelling around the eye. As long as the patient follows the ophthalmologists recommendations once they arrive home after the surgery, they should be absolutely fine and able to see much better. If you live in the Cedar Park, Austin, Georgetown or Round Rock area in Texas, and you find that you have cataracts that you need to have taken care of, look for a ophthalmologist Austin who is skilled in performing cataract surgery, and you will find that your problem can be fixed not only easily, but relatively quickly as well. They can answer all of your questions about glaucoma eye surgery and dry eyes treatment.
This surgery actually removes the natural lens and replaces it with what is known as an IOL, or an intraocular lens implant. This implant actually helps to improve the vision and is a much better option than the previous option, which was a corneal transplant austin. These procedures are very common for today’s ophthalmologists to perform, much like how they frequently perform lasik surgery.
The Procedure
It’s common to wonder how the procedure is performed. When you have this form of macular degeneration, an ophthalmologist will perform an macular degeneration treatment by numbing the eye and then by making a very small incision into it. The damaged lens is then removed and replaced with an intraocular lens implant. A few sutures (occasionally no sutures are necessary) will be placed to close the opening and then the patient is able to go home with a patch on their eye. Ask your eye doctor about LASIK correction for your eyes.
About the Author: Mark Masters has authored may pieces on the eye care & surgery industry and enjoys keeping his readers up to date in this field
