Protecting your eyes
the natural way
By Joyce Tellier Johnson, N.D.
ACCORDING TO A STUDY conducted by the National Eye Institute
(
www.nei.nih.gov), Americans fear blindness more than any other disability,
including cancer and heart disease.
More than 3. 5 million Americans over the age of 40 suffer from some sort of
vision loss. The chances of developing eyesight problems increase dramatically
with age, due partly to environmental conditions such as cigarette smoke and
ultraviolet radiation damage from the sun and partly to the body’s inability to
synthesize nutrients that protect and enhance eye health and vision. Cataracts
and age-related macular degeneration (AMD) are the top two age-related causes
of blindness or reduced vision.
Age-related macular degeneration
Macular degeneration is a descriptive term for any condition that leads
to loss of function of the light-sensitive cells at the center of the retina.
Peripheral vision is preserved, but reading becomes impossible. Blurred or
distorted vision and trouble discerning colors can be symptoms of AMD.
The Amsler grid test is one of the simplest and most effective methods of
monitoring macular health. The Amsler grid is a pattern of intersecting lines
(identical to graph paper) with a black dot in the middle. One stares at the
central dot. With normal vision, all lines surrounding the black dot will look
straight and evenly spaced, with no missing or odd-looking areas. When the
macula is not healthy, as in macular degeneration, the lines can look bent,
distorted and/or missing.
You can order a free Amsler test grid online at
www.ixm.us or take the
test at
www.eyesight.org/Eye_Test/eye_test.html.
Cataracts
A cataract is a clouding of the lens in one or both eyes that affects vision.
Most cataracts are related to aging. In a normal eye, light passes through the
