You may keep asking what is exactly lazy eye? How is it caused? And what’s the treatment for lazy eye? Before I touch on these topics, you should know that the medical term for lazy eye is called amblyopia. Even though it is called lazy eye, amblyopia is not much of a problem with the eye at all but, it is an issue with the brain and how the brain has learned to appreciate and see a vision with the affected eye. So it is more of a neurological condition. Lazy eye or amblyopia is a medical condition that normally happens in just one eye. Amblyopia develops when there’s a breakdown in the working of the brain and the eye in that the brain can’t recognize the vision from one eye. As time passes, the brain relies on the stronger eye and this results in poor vision in the other eye. You may ask why is it called lazy eye? It is called so because the stronger eye works better and the other eye gets worse, gets lazy, but people having these conditions are not lazy. Amblyopia is one of the common causes of visual impairment in children. Sometimes amblyopia affects both eyes.
A number of things can disturb the normal brain-eye connections and cause lazy eye to develop. Refractive error in the eye is one of the most common causes of amblyopia. If not treated early in childhood, it results in poor visual functions of the eye/s and it is referred to as refractive amblyopia. Another cause is strabismus or misalignment, an eye condition in which the eyes are not pointing to the same direction. In rare cases, structural anomaly like a droopy eyelid or opacity in the visual axis like cataract and corneal scar impair the visual functions of the eye and may lead to vision loss.
There are three common types of amblyopia and all of them can lead to visual impairment. As I noted earlier, amblyopia affects children’s ability to see objects and the more they rely on the stronger eye, the more they destroy the weaker ones. Types of lazy eye or amblyopia are:
- Strabismus amblyopia
Normally, in a functioning visual system, the two eyes work as a team. Strabismus is a medical condition in which one or both eyes misaligns. In strabismus amblyopia, the brain uses one eye to see and totally ignores the other and this is because it is always turned in, out, up, or down.
- Refractive or anisometropic amblyopia
Refractive errors within the eye, are the most common cause of amblyopia. Refractive amblyopia has two types; Anisometropic amblyopia caused by distinct refractive errors of each eye and Isoametropic amblyopia which develops when both eyes are amblyopic from a significant refractive error.
- Deprivation or occlusion amblyopia
As the name indicates, this medical condition appears when one eye is deprived of vision because of the development of a blockage. Deprivation amblyopia can affect both eyes and need to be treated early on to prevent poor vision.
When somebody is diagnosed with amblyopia, there’s often questioning on how do we treat lazy eye? Well, thankfully there are several different strategies we can use to help the eye see better. One thing you have to remember is that these treatments work better in young children, particularly when they are under the age of about 8 or 9 years old while the brain still has more neural plasticity. However, many studies showed that older children and even adults had improved their visual ability using these treatments. The treatments are often tailored and personalized based on the type and severity of the condition but in general, they usually involve a combination of these following treatments.
- Some form of glasses or other optical correction
- Patching or occlusion therapy
- Vision therapy also known as VT
- Surgery
As I said earlier, lazy eye is a condition whereby the patient as a child below the age of seven has had some obstruction in their vision. This may be in the form of a refractive error that wasn’t treated with glasses, it may be due to an injury, a cataract, or something which has obstructed some vision in the child's early years. As a result of this blockage of vision, what happens is that the eye only learns to see a certain point. So, laser eye surgery is the only way able to refine or improve the vision in a lazy eye to a level that an eye can achieve with its current pair of glasses. Your eye doctor is not able to refine the vision further because some pathways were not developed when the child was very young.
Eye care in Iran has become one of the salient treatment in the field of medical tourism. Iran is a hub for eye surgery in the Middle-east and that’s due to Iranian advancement in medical branches. Affordable cost of eye surgery is another reason and in recent years, has attracted so many foreign patients. Every year, we see people flocking to Iran to have various types of eye surgery and one substantial incentive is the affordable cost of eye surgery.
MedtourIran is an online and active medical facilitator in Iran. MedtourIran provides the best and most suitable eye treatments and other medical treatments for international patients. Eye surgery in MedtourIran is performed in top hospitals and clinics at affordable cost. What’s more, our package for eye treatment includes transfer, residence, hotel, free sim-card, and an interpreter. Before you come to Iran, you will have a free consultation about your eye condition to determine the most suitable treatment. But that’s doesn’t end here. You’ll have follow-up while you’re at the recovery period to make sure your eye is fully recovered and avoid side effects. If you need more information, feel free to visit our website MedTourIran.com and contact our doctors to have a free consultation regarding your eye condition.
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