February is AMD and Low Vision Awareness Month
February is AMD and Low Vision Awareness Month. We encourage you to always be mindful of the importance of checking your vision at home. Early detection is vital to prevent urgent vision problems. Allowing timely treatment of eye diseases including macular degeneration is crucial for preserving your eye health.
Provided below are three examples of ways you can check your vision at home.
Ways to check your vision at home include:
- Cover one eye at a time
- Use an Amsler Grid
- ForeseeHome AMD Monitoring Program
Covering one eye at a time to check your vision is important because it isolates your vision in each individual eye. This may allow you to identify potential problems in one eye because the problem may not be noticeable with both eyes open. In other words, the vision in the better eye will sometimes mask the problem, and the problem may not be as obvious. With Macular Degeneration, you can have significant visual discrepancies between each eye, and early detection is key. Checking one eye at a time will help prevent the good eye from masking the weaker one. This will allow a more reliable way to check your vision in each eye.
An Amsler Grid helps you monitor for changes in the central vision involving your macula. The Amsler is made up of a square grid that includes evenly dispersed vertical and horizontal lines with a small dot in the center. Noticing changes on your Amsler grid can detect early signs of macular degeneration. Once diagnosed with macular degeneration it is recommended to continue monitoring your vision daily with the Amsler grid to check for vision changes. Early detection is key to preserve vision.
If you are in our office and interested in one of these Amsler Grid Magnets, please let us know, and we would be happy to provide you with one!
ForeseeHome AMD Monitoring is a successful, at-home monitoring system used by Intermediate AMD patients. This system is a Medicare-credentialed Provider. The ForeseeHome AMD Monitoring system must be referred to you by your retina specialist. Photo credit: Foresee Home and Monitoring Program
Not affected by low vision or AMD but want to help, or have AMD or low vision and want to get involved? There are multiple opportunities and ways to get involved around our community. Foundation Fighting Blindness(FFB), South Central Kentucky Council of the Blind, or an AMD support group held in your local community are just a few. The FFB helps fund research in areas including genetics, gene and stem cell therapies, retinal cell transplantation, and pharmaceutical and nutritional therapies. Follow this link to learn more about the FFB fightingblindness.org/about/about-us.
The South Central Kentucky Council of the Blind and its parent organization, the American Council of the Blind, strive to increase the independence, security equality of opportunity and quality of life for all blind and visually impaired people. Click this link to learn more about the South Central KY Council of the Blind sckcb.org/wp.
If you or a loved one has been diagnosed with AMD, there is a AMD support group that meets in Murfreesboro. This support group is for seniors diagnosed with Age-Related Macular Degeneration. This group allows members to share experiences, support each other, learn from one another and make new friends. The support group meets one Thursday per month at the St Clair Street Senior Center in Murfreesboro. Please follow this link for additional location and contact information for the support group murfreesborotn.gov.