What if I tell you that a giant Space Agency does something gigantic, which is nowhere on the road of Space Exploration??? I bet you won’t buy it.
The chances of credence reduce even further when the name is NASA and the discovery is vision-related!
NASA’s stargazing techniques have helped protect VISION in thousands of children [literally!]
The technique has its roots in the year 1980. Scientists at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight worked with research eye specialists and industry partners. Result – they adapted space optics technology into a new eye screening test, called ‘PhotoRefraction’! [The split words seemed very repetitive to me at the first glance.]
During this process, a beam of light shines into a patient’s eyes, bends inside, then reflects an image back to a camera. The result is something like the ‘red eye’ you might see in your vacation pictures – but this holds critical vision clues.
The image clues give a fair idea about one’s sight. For instance, if the eyes are focusing light for normal vision, the image shows a smooth ‘full moon’ of red over the retina. If the eyes have abnormalities, the image changes. Farsightedness reflects a bright half moon over the top of the pupil. In nearsightedness, the light reflects as a brighter crescent moon in the bottom half of the eye. Other potential problems also show distinct patterns of reflection.
However, it does not replace the Professional Eye Testing Procedure; instead, it gives subtle hints of early vision.
This concept is as simple as clicking a pic. Apart from this, it can be tested on any age group, not worrying if the person knows how to read, as in the traditional technique. It is painless and makes mass screening possible.
The best till date example follows…
In a single school year, more than 150,000 Alabama elementary school students were screened. Over 3,000 had early indications of Amblyopia [Lazy Eye] – the leading cause of preventable blindness in children. Left untreated after age seven, it can cause permanent vision loss. It is estimated that 1 in 40 children have precursors of this condition, which leads to 17 percent of all adult blindness.
Since the inception of PhotoRefraction, hundreds of thousands of children have been treated for eye problems that might have gone unnoticed, leading to blindness and decreased quality of life.
After all, early detection leads to early correction.Let us try finding which moon dwells in our eyes (must have heard of having only stars in our eyes!!) so that our vision is saved to see those stars high up in the sky!!!
Roma Kalani's Blog... 