Saturday, October 15, 2022Updated Saturday, October 15, 2022 at 6:39:06 p.m.• Question.- What are the most common ocular pathologies or conditions that you find on a day-to-day basis in the patients who come to your consultation?Answer.- In general, the most frequent pathology in ophthalmology is the alteration of refraction.Refraction is the patient's vision, this means that either they don't see far away or they don't see close up, or both.Fundamentally, in children or young people it is more a myopia problem than, today, just as there is a Covid-19 pandemic, there is also a myopia pandemic.Why?because now all the devices and all the screen instruments that we have, such as tablets and mobile phones, affect vision and imply that the patient or the citizen uses a lot of close-up vision and that causes, especially in young people and children a very large increase in myopia.Another very common pathology is cataract.Cataract is the leading cause of reversible visual deficit in adults.A cataract is an opacification of the lens, the patient gradually stops seeing.Glaucoma is also worth mentioning.It is a very treacherous disease, as I say, because it damages the optic nerve.Glaucoma is a pathology that does not show its face, does not hurt, does not take away vision until a very late episode.That is why it is very important that all patients go for check-ups every year or two and take their blood pressure to see if they have glaucoma.And a last very common disease is senile macular degeneration.We have a very high life expectancy, the patient no longer dies at 60 or 70 years, it can reach 90 and even 100, so it is a pathology that we are seeing very frequently.Until recently there was no treatment, no chance of recovery, but now treatments are appearing that can, if not improve vision, at least stop its loss.Q.- How often should a child have eye exams?A.- For example, in children, it is very important that, around four or five years old, an age that we ophthalmologists call a healthy age or healthy child, they have their first check-up.The lazy eye, which we all know what it is, also known as amblyopia, can be in a child.This means that perhaps one eye does not see and the other sees perfectly.Well, the child, just like the adult, lives his life with both eyes open and there are times when he doesn't realize it.When we do a routine check-up we cover one eye, we see the vision of it and then we do the same with the other and that is where we realize that there is a deficit in one of the two.Q.- In case of finding this deficit in children, when could the treatment be applied?A.- It is important to do it when the child is three or four years old because if this is done, for example, at age 15, it would already be too late.At three or four years old we can already put on glasses, patches, etc.So, it is very important to find it in time and put a solution to be able to recover, because the older it gets, the more vision the eye loses.Q.- And in the case of adults?A.- In adulthood, well, there is presbyopia that can appear in middle age, around 45 years old, cataracts after 60, etc.There is also eye strain, if you have a family history it is very likely that the glaucoma that I spoke about before may appear.A fundamental component is heredity, for example, if we have a father or a mother, an uncle, a grandfather... who has glaucoma, who has high blood pressure, it is important, at least every two years, to have a check-up.Q.- What should be done to better control the health of the eyes?A.- The first thing is to have a review and see if there is any defect, any deficit.There is one thing that is very common today, which is dry eye.There are two types: on the one hand, there is the water-deficient dry eye and on the other, the evaporative one.It happens very frequently.One may or may not have tears or live or work in an environment that produces dryness.For example, an office with air conditioning, with a screen, etc.causes that there are not many tears, so the non-tearing, the tear deficit produces inflammation, produces dryness, vision alterations... In principle, we must put artificial tears to improve that and if we do not improve with that, there are ways to treatment that are a little more intensive, as is the case with IPL, which stimulate the natural tearing of the eyes.Q.- As you have said before, cataracts are one of the most frequent eye pathologies associated with age. What are the main advances that have been made to correct them in recent years?A.- Indeed, the cataract, since I began to operate cataracts 30 years ago, has changed completely.You have to think that the cataract is an opacification of the lens.When we are born, we have a completely transparent and flexible lens.It thickens and thins to focus on the far or the near when we are young.From the age of forty, approximately, because it is already hardening and it is no longer capable of having that flexibility to focus far or near.Already, from the age of sixty or sixty-five, well, it gets darker and one loses vision.So today cataract surgery is done with topical anesthesia.No general anesthesia or anything.It is a 20-minute surgery, it is usually fast and it has a good and fast recovery.The eye is not usually covered and stitches are not usually given, we simply replace the lens, which is a natural lens, with an artificial lens.That artificial lens, which we can establish, which we can change for the lens, can be varied.It can be a monofocal lens, which gives us only distance vision, it can be a toric lens, where the patient's astigmatism is treated, or a multifocal and toric multifocal lens, which we implant in the patient to reach what we want, ametropia.Nowadays, if the patient wants cataract surgery, he does not have to need glasses, neither far, nor close, nor intermediate, or anything.And that, today, can be achieved.Cataract surgery is the same for all patients and the only change is the implantation of the intraocular lens.We can get a toric multifocal intraocular lens, so that the patient stays at zero or very close to zero graduation for all distances.Q.- In addition to advances to correct cataracts, what other innovative techniques or advances exist?A.- There is a novelty, a current technique, the so-called refractive surgery.This is a surgery used for the treatment and removal of glasses.This is done in younger people, in people fifty years old and below, who have myopia, hyperopia, astigmatism, etc.We use the excimer laser, so the patient who is twenty years old and who has myopia, if he uses this laser, the need to wear glasses can be eliminated.And the truth is that, today, we can say that it is a surgical technique that is very fast, becoming quite effective and also has extraordinary results.This is the opinion of the readers, not that of this medium.We reserve the right to delete innapropiate comments.Participation implies that you have read and accept the Rules of Participation and Privacy PolicyFor security we keep your IP 104.223.218.2There are no comments yet.The Spanishness of Ceuta and Melilla is “unquestionable”something more than wordsA world on your wheelsWednesday, October 12, 2022Hispanic Heritage DaySome territorial examples benefited by the reinforced national fabricA WEEK OF LOCAL RADIOMore Than One CeutaJavier Angel Diez NietoSaturday, October 08, 2022Cui prodest…globalism or sovereignty?150 years of the Railway Units in the Historical Military Library of CeutaBishopric of Cádiz and CeutaSaturday, October 01, 2022Good morning, this morning around 11 in the morning, my motorcycle was stolen in C/Calderón de la Barca in broad daylight... 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