Treatment and therapy of severe short-sightedness and myopic CNV
Severe short-sightedness – high myopia Ophthalmologist help for patients
Severe short-sightedness – also called high myopia – can affect people at any age. Therefore, we recommend everyone who already suffers from a mild form of short-sightedness to pay special attention for the myopia’s progress and to conduct regular early detection monitoring with us.
What is myopia?
The meaning of severe short-sightedness
Severe short-sightedness is characterised by very bad distance vision.
Ophthalmologists speak of a high myopia – severe short-sightedness – starting from a value of –6 dioptres.
This extreme value relates to a size of the ocular globe – also called bulbus oculi – of usually more than 26 millimetres. This is a deviation of at least 2 millimeters more than what people with normal sight have.
Learn everything about severe short-sightedness and myopic CNV and how we can help you. Please get in touch with us, if you have any questions concerning the disease or would like to have advice. We take a lot of time for our patients.
Severe short-sightedness – who is affected and why?
Who is affected from severe short-sightedness?
The severe type of short-sightedness – ophthalmologists call it myopia – is a disease occurring all around the globe, developed by ca. 50,000 people per annum. In Germany, 1 to 3 percent of the population are currently affected.
The disease can begin at any age and cause severe near-sightedness also among young people. Quite often, those affected are younger than fifty.
What causes severe short-sightedness?
The exact origins of the illness are still not known to date. Therefore, we recommend to have your eyes checked at regular screenings, especially if you already suffer from a mild form of short-sightedness.
Untreated, the disease continually diminishes the visual acuity which cannot be rectified in retrospect. That’s why early diagnose and therapy are key in order to prevent foreseeable damaging that may lead to blindness.
Visual aids for severe short-sighted patients
How to improve your eyesight if you have myopia
Thanks to modern means of correction, severe short-sighted people don’t need to rely on massive spectacle frames with thick glasses anymore. Today, up-to-date cuts provide for thinner glasses with fashionable frames that are designed for severe short-sighted persons.
Contact lenses, too, are of help for those affected.
If you as a patient suffer from high glare sensitivity, you have the option to use edge-filter lenses that absorb UV light and visible blue light.
Myopic CNV – Severe short-sightedness
Complications in the course of severe short-sightedness:
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Pathological myopia
If you’re a patient, you suffer enough from bad vision already. In the course of the illness, however, your vision may get worse due to complications. Specialists call this pathological myopia.
Because of the largely prolonged shape of the ocular globe, the retina and the choroid might get stretched to an extent that results at worst in a extremely thin retina.
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Myopic CNV
Severe short-sightedness and pathological vessels: Myopic CNV
As a consequence, pathological changes may occur such as small cracks between choroid and retina that have been described as „cracks in the paint“.
These cracks foster a pathological growth of new vessels inside the field of the sharpest vision – also called the yellow spot / macula – that also grow into the retina. Then, ophthalmologists speak of myopic choroidal neovascularisation – or short myopic CNV.
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The risk of blindness through myopic CNV
The risk of blindness
As the problematic development proceeds, the severe short-sighted patient’s eyesight is threatened. Without treatment, about 90 percent of those affected become blind.
Retinal damages may also emerge through newly formed, leaky vessel that excrete liquid and blood. Because this affects the photoreceptors and the field of sharpest vision gets scarred.
Even without the forming of pathological vessels, the retina is affected and the patient’s visual ability suffers.
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Symptoms of myopic CNV
Patients often suffer from a slow – sometimes sudden – worsening of vision, resulting from the pathological vessels. In the event of liquid or blood seeping from a leaky vessel, the patient’s first impression is usually a distortion of vision – what ophthalmologists call metamorphopsies.
Image distortion or warped lines in the field of vision
Immediately to the ophthalmologist
Whenever straight lines suddenly seem warped, for example the joints between tiles, a visit at the ophthalmologist’s is absolutely indicated. Quite often, myopic CNV patients experience a sudden worsening of vision by seeing blurred or even a blackout of the central field of vision, manifesting in the seeing of shadows or dark spots.
Affected patients feel massively handicapped in everyday life: Objects and persons are not or only partially recognised.
Classic myopic CNV symptoms at a glance:
- Affected persons have distorted vision
- Affected persons have blurred vision
- Affected persons see shadows or spots in the central field of vision
Diagnosis of harmful vessel growth (CNV)
Our diagnostic offer:
As ophthalmologists, we can examine and diagnose myopic CNV for patients with pathological short-sightedness.
We use the following classical eye tests:
- Eye chart
- Amsler grid
We conduct the following examination of the ocular fundus:
- Slit-lamp examination with ophthalmoscopy (funduscopy) of the retina when the pupils are dilated
This examination entails that the patient doesn’t actively participate in public traffic for some hours afterwards.
Extended Diagnostics
Detailed statements assessing newly formed pathological vessels inside retina and choroid:
- Optical coherence tomography (OCT) – Layer photography of the retina for precise diagnosis of liquid deposition and disorders within the respective retina layers
- OCT angiography: Non-invasive vessel examination of the retina that can display many pathological changes
- Fluorescene angiography – a colourant is injected into the arm vein. It reaches the eye through the vascular system, where a special camera is used. Pathological findings can be diagnosed and evaluated thanks to the colour dispersion.
Treatment and therapy of pathological short-sightedness and myopic CNV
Our offer for the treatment and therapy of myopic CNV
Any therapy of myopic CNV is most promising, when you start it at an very early stage of the disease.
This gives the chance to save the patient’s vision and maybe even enhance it.
Our ophthalmologist therapy approaches:
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Classic laser therapy
Classic laser therapy obliterates newly formed leaking vessels through a hot laser beam. This stops the constant seeping of liquid and blood and puts the visual loss to a halt. But laser is only used if the open vessels are located outside of the field of sharpest vision, because the treatment causes minimal scars and healthy photoreceptors might become obliterated as well.
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Treatment with VEGF inhibitors
Pathological short-sightedness and the ongoing pathological growth of leaking vessels can also be treated with medicaments.
VEGF stands for a growth factor that fosters new blood vessels, leaks, and resulting edemas. Affected patients have an increased VEGF level in their eyes.
VEGF inhibitors can block the growth and the forming of vessels and edemas in the eye is reduced. There is a chance that existing damage can be rectified, as well. The regression of leaks and edemas is supported by VEGF inhibitors, too. All of this improves the patient’s vision.
Treatment with VEGF inhibitors
As practicing ophthalmologists, we give our patients the medicament, a liquid substance, by injection into the vitreous body under local anaesthesia. You won’t feel much at all from this procedure as a patient. After a few days already, patients will profit from this treatment because of a palpable improvement of vision. In the course of the treatment, a significant optimisation can set in within a year, without any damaging of the retina.
Depending on the condition, even a single injection may bring success already.