- Affect 10 million
Americans who suffer from loss of visual function; half
a million are legally blind.
- Include cataracts,
glaucoma, age-related maculopathy, and diseases of the retina
and choroid - the leading causes of blindness and visual
disability in the U.S.
- Cost our nation
more than $14 billion every year.
PROGRESS
IN MEDICAL RESEARCH
The visual system
is highly organized and complex. A major portion of the brain
is directly and exclusively involved with the visual process.
Understanding the process of vision and the disorders that
affect it is intertwined with our knowledge of the human nervous
system.
How
has animal research helped people with eye diseases and disorders?
Animal models
have been of critical importance to surgeons and researchers.
Development of laser techniques, transplants, and other surgical
processes have been dependent on the use of animals to educate
and instruct those in the medical profession. In 1981, the
Nobel prize in Medicine was awarded to Drs. Hubel and Wiesel
for their work on cortical cells and processes in cats, the
cat eye having many similarities to the human eye. Their work
has been of major significance in our understanding of how
the brain processes vision and has lead to the development
of treatments aimed at restoring lost vision in children.
A
Case in Point: Corneal Transplants
Today, corneal
transplants restore sight to thousands of people annually.
Over the past 30 years, the Michigan Eye-Bank & Transplantation
Center has provided ophthalmic surgeons the surgical tissue
for corneal transplants for more than 10,000 blind or visually
impaired patients. The very early work to develop precision
tools and microsurgical techniques required to cut out a cloudy
cornea and sew in tissue from a deceased eye donor would not
have been confidently attempted on humans without many animal
trials first. After hundreds of practice transplants on rabbits,
the very first human corneal transplant in Michigan was performed
at the University of Michigan Hospital in 1957.found.
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