[Shalyndria]

Have you seen your Ophthalmologist lately?

Diabetes is the leading cause of visual impairment in the United States among patients below the age of 50. If left untreated, diabetes eye complications can be devastating. Diabetic retinopathy causes 12,000 to 24,000 new cases of blindness each year. CDC

What are the risk factors for diabetic retinopathy?
High blood sugar is perhaps the most important factor, but high blood pressure and high lipid levels such as cholesterol also substantially increase the risk of getting diabetic retinopathy. So all three need to be controlled.

Because the prevalence of diabetes increases with age, diabetic retinopathy is more common in older people. But the other diseases we studied that are typically diseases of elderly people (cataracts, glaucoma and age-related macular degeneration) are strongly related to increased age, whereas diabetic retinopathy is more related to time with diabetes. So often people are diagnosed with diabetes at a young age, and therefore we see diabetic retinopathy in people aged 40 and older.

Are there early warning signs of diabetic retinopathy?
There can be, but the big problem with the disease is that it's often silent until suddenly major vision loss occurs. People might notice that their vision's getting blurry or a sudden onset of floating spots in their vision. These signs may indicate substantially advanced retinopathy.

Is retinopathy ever a first sign of diabetes?
Yes, in the population-based studies that have been done, a number of people who had diabetic retinopathy had not realized they had diabetes.

How often should people be screened for retinopathy?
Some studies have found that only 41 percent of people with diabetes are getting annual eye exams. It's recommended that everybody with type 2 diabetes, or the adult-onset type of diabetes, be screened annually for diabetic retinopathy and persons with type 1 diabetes should be screened annually, beginning five years after they were diagnosed with diabetes.

What does that eye exam involve?
Generally, a complete eye exam is done, but the key part of the exam is to examine the retina while the pupil is dilated. This involves what is called indirect ophthalmoscopy, which allows me to look through a lens at the retina, so I get a panoramic view of all the different parts of the retina.

It's best to be screened on a regular basis. Clinical experience suggests that there are a number of people who come in too late, or at a point where we're sort of picking up pieces rather than preventing things from going wrong.

Take care of those peepers!!

Shy

[lgvincent]

I've got what looks like about one million floaters in vision now but it's due to the retinoschisis I developed several years ago and has nothing to do with diabetes.