March 13, 2018 - Farsightedness (Presbyopia)
Hey folks, it’s Dr. Sam and I received the question about whether Gaber patch technology can help reverse presbyopia.
About 112 million Americans suffer presbyopia and this is expected to increase to 123 million Americans by the year 2020. Worldwide, nearly 1.3 billion people suffer from presbyopia and this is expected to nearly double to 2.1 billion people by the year 2020.
Presbyopia is the hardening of the lens of the eye and the loss of muscle flexibility over the age of 35. This is what creates the need for magnification lenses. This can cause you to develop headaches, eye strain, and you have to push the reading material further out. Ultimately, the only answer is is to start wearing your magnifiers.
In the holistic eye health world, in terms of presbyopia, I know that there are certain reasons presbyopia is becoming more prevalent and that there are natural methods you can do to slow and even reverse the condition.
What Causes Presbyopia?
I think one of the main factors of presbyopia on the increase has to do with the digital device use. This causes us to focus, for long periods of time, at one distance. This hardens the lens of the eye and reduces our muscle flexibility. If we’re using progressive lenses or multifocal lenses, we are forced to focus through a tiny hole in our focusing system. This puts a lot of stress on our eyes and our brain in order to be able to see. Over time this increases our visual stress and it’s going to accelerate presbyopia.
If you wear monovision corrective lenses, or one eye is corrected for distance or one eye is corrected for near, this puts incredible stress on the near eye to that has to do all the focusing. This can also occur through Lasik surgery, monovision, and also cataract surgery. I don’t recommend using monovision lenses in these situations because it’s going to accelerate your presbyopia.
Oxidative stress can also accelerate presbyopia. If you’re not getting enough oxygenation and hydration into the tissue, especially the lens of the eye. When you’re under stress, this is going to accelerate the lack of oxygenation and hydration, and it’s going to increase free radical accumulation. So you want to make sure to supplement with things like glutathione and other nutrients essential for eye health. These are very important nutrients have been that have been shown to actually reduce oxidative stress and to get rid of free radical damage. This will make your eye tissue more responsive and improve their ability to release stress and improve vision.
If you wear the reading magnifiers for the computer it’s going to make your eye muscles work harder and create visual stress. In some of my work, I have found that people that develop presbyopia do so because they’re not using both of their eyes together. In one test that I do with my patients, I can tell if both eyes are focusing on the same task or if the brain is suppressing or shutting off the left eye. This is very common because the right eye tends to do all of the work but it gets more fatigued. When you wear the magnification lenses, it will just make the right eye do more and more of the work.
Does Gabor Patching Work?
The premise of Gabor patching is that you look at certain patterns that are parallel lines. They flash at different speeds to stimulate the visual cortex. I tried this program for a week and I found that my visual recognition and reaction time actually increased. However, in this eye exercise program, there was no conversation at any point during to include the eyes into the eye exercise program. So yes you can stimulate a visual processing in the visual cortex, but you have to include the eyes in the equation. Where you want to include eye exercises to improve eye muscle flexibility and visual coordination into this Gabor patch program.
It’s interesting that most doctors don’t include the brain in terms of the visual processing and visual exercise program. Then there are people who are not doctors who talk about the brain as the source of improving the visual system, but they’re not including the eyes in the conversation. Folks, let’s include the eyes and brain in the conversation – vision is a whole-body process. It’s not just the brain. It’s not just the eyes. It’s both! When we include the eyes and brain in the solution, we will have more lasting and effective results.
Another thing with the Gabor patch technology that I did not care for was the lack of conversation about the effect of blue light on the eyes. If you’re doing this program on a digital device, be sure to wear blue light protective lenses. Personally, I prefer to work in free space. That means that I don’t like to use technology when I’m doing my physical therapy for the eyes. When you do freespace eye exercises, you’re actually returning to a more natural experience and working your visual system in its natural environment.
Overall, you may be able to not only slow down but actually reverse the progression of presbyopia. So if you can walk away with one take-home message, it’s that we cannot blame presbyopia on the eyes. We must include the brain and body in the conversion.
I want to thank you for tuning in. And until next time take good care.