Researchers from Baylor and Harvard Universities claim that parents can check their children for retinoblastoma using their digital cameras.

 

Using photographs taken with amateur digital cameras, the researchers themselves observed evidence of leukocoria or “white eye,” the main symptom of retinoblastoma. These findings pave the way for the development of methods to enable earlier detection of this eye cancer, which mostly occurs in children from birth to five years old. Early diagnosis is crucial, as this cancer can cause severe vision loss, the loss of one or both eyes, even death if it spreads to the brain.

 

“Newborns and infants don’t typically get checked out by an ophthalmologist, but many of them do get their retinas scanned multiple times a week, when mom or dad are snapping pictures to share on Facebook,” said Bryan Shaw, assistant professor of chemistry and biochemistry at Baylor University. “In a majority of retinoblastoma cases, it is the parents that initiate the diagnosis based on seeing leukocoria or ‘white eye’ in photos of their children.”

 

Leukocoria is often detected after the tumour has already significantly grown in size. This research is a major step toward the creation of software that will help parents notice the symptoms sooner.

Source:

http://eyewiretoday.com/view.asp?r=crstoday&a=20131111-parents_can_check_their_kids_for_retinoblastoma_using_digital_photography

 

Children born extremely prematurely are more likely to develop retinal detachment than those born at term, according to a Swedish study.

 

This is the first long-term study on the link between the two conducted on a large population base. The researchers studied the files of more than three million births in Sweden between 1973 and 2008. They separated the individuals into two groups, based on whether they were born before or after 1986, the year a national retinopathy of prematurity screening program was established.

 

The results showed a connection between preterm births and this type of eye condition:

 

• Children born extremely prematurely (less than 28 weeks of gestation) between 1973 and 1986 had a 19-fold higher risk of retinal detachment. That rate fell to nine times higher for those born after 1986.
• Children born very prematurely (28 to 31 weeks of gestation) between 1973 and 1986 had a four-fold increased risk, and that rate fell to three times higher for those born after 1986.
• Moderately preterm birth (32 to 36 weeks of gestation) did not have a significant impact on this type of risk.

 

“We may just be seeing the tip of the iceberg of late ophthalmic complications after preterm birth. Not only does the risk of retinal detachment increase with age, but there has also been an increase in survival among people born prematurely since the 1970s,” says Swedish pediatrician Anna-Karin Edstedt Bonamy.

Source:

http://www.aao.org/newsroom/release/premature-birth-retina-detachment.cfm

 

 

A recent study shows that blindness results in a permanent state of pain hypersensitivity, which is manifested, in particular, by a hypersensitivity to thermal stimuli.

 

One of the biological functions of acute pain is to prevent injury. Vision plays a critical role in this function, as it allows a person to detect and avoid potentially hazardous situations. But what happens in people who are blind? A recent study conducted in Italy and in Denmark indicates that they compensate for the absence of vision with a heightened vigilance for pain.

 

The three experiments conducted on blind people and people with normal vision consisted in measuring their pain threshold and the detection thresholds for warmth and cold perceptions. The results showed that, compared to sighted people, congenitally blind people had lower heat pain thresholds, found heat pain stimuli to be more painful and had increased sensitivity to cold pain stimuli.

 

“We have shown that the absence of vision from birth induces a hypersensitivity to painful stimuli, lending new support to a model of sensory integration of vision and pain processing,” explained Dr. Ron Kupers, from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark.

Sources:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/11/131101125413.htm

http://www.painjournalonline.com/article/S0304-3959(13)00275-3/abstract

Elias Benguigui, a well-known figure in Canada’s optical industry, particularly for his work with Perfect Optical, died during the night of November 10–11.

 

Elias Benguigui died at home, at the age of 83, just after he decided to embark on a well-deserved retirement. He had been having heart failure for a few months, but had regained his strength and started to exercise again. “He continued to be actively involved in Perfect Optical almost to the very end,” says his nephew, Adrian Maas. “Not even a year ago, we were still traveling around the world together to meet clients. Retirement just wasn’t for him!”

 

A native of Tangier, Morocco, Elias Benguigui initially resided in France after the Second World War, before coming to Canada to join his brother, Jacques, founder of Perfect Optical. Together, they worked long hours to make their company a success. “They would go all the way to Manitoba to present their products, though neither spoke a word of English,” says Adrian Maas. “But they didn’t care – they had good products to sell and they did it well.” In 1999, Elias Benguigui founded Superclip Canada with Adrian Maas.

 

Those who would like to pay their last respects can do so on Wednesday, November 13, at 3:00 p.m., at Paperman & Fils, located at 3888, Jean-Talon Street West, in Montreal.

 

A joint study by the University of Rochester in New York and Vanderbilt University in Tennessee suggests that fifty per cent of people can see and follow their own body movements in the dark.

 

The study was conducted on 129 participants from Rochester, Nashville and Seoul, a certain number of whom were synesthetes, or people who experience a blending of their senses which allows them, for instance, to see numbers or letters in different colours when they read.

 

During the experiment, participants were first asked to wear a blindfold which seemed to have holes in it. The researchers told them that they would see movements in low lighting. They were then given a blindfold without any holes and told that they would not see anything. In fact, none of the blindfolds had any holes that would allow participants to see. 

 

Participants were asked to wave their hands in front of their eyes and try to see the hand of a researcher who was also waving a hand. An eye-tracking device followed their eye movements. Although none of the participants was able to detect the movements of the researcher’s hand, half of them were able to see and follow the movements of their own hand, which means, according to the researchers, that hand movement sends a visual signal to the brain. Synesthetes were particularly skilled at seeing movements, one of whom was even able to see almost as well in the dark as in the light.

 

“This research shows that our own movements transmit sensory signals that also can create real visual perceptions in the brain, even in the complete absence of optical input,” explains Professor Duje Tadin, from the University of Rochester.

 

Source:

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/268281.php