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A Mount Maunganui optometrist is about to start trials on a potential treatment for age-related macular degeneration.
Optometrist Tony Han.
If the trials are successful, the new treatment could be a breakthrough in managing the county’s leading cause of blindness in the over 50s.
Tony Han says age-related macular degeneration is a disease which affects one in seven people over the age of 50.
“It occurs when the central part of the retina – the macula – is damaged, causing difficulties in reading, recognising faces, driving and seeing colours clearly.”
Tony will be trialling the natural health supplement Vinpocetine as part of his Master thesis, along with a research team at Auckland University.
He says it’s exciting to be involved in such ground-breaking research.
“If this supplement works, it will really change a lot of lives because instead of living in blindness, at-risk people will have their vision preserved in their older years.
“It means people don’t need to accept difficulty with their vision as just a part of getting older.”
Tony says he’s really thrilled at the prospect of helping people keep their eyesight for a much longer period of time.
Tony will be trialling the effects of Vinpocetine on 50 Bay of Plenty residents over the next two years.
Vinpocetine is a synthetic compound made from the leaves of the lesser periwinkle plant.
Developed in the late 1960s, it’s proven to dilate blood vessels, enhance circulation in the brain, improve oxygen utilisation and make red blood cells more pliable.
Tony says while the treatment could preserve the vision of many, early detection is still crucial.
“Like many eye diseases, the effects of age-related macular degeneration can potentially be greatly lessened with early detection.
“Eye tests are really important because the disease can be detected in an eye examination long before a patient even notices anything wrong with their vision.”
The trials will test the effect of Vinpocetine on the progression of the dry form of age-related macular degeneration and will start in February.
