Myopia progression management takes centre stage

On the day President Donald Trump arrived in London to meet the Queen, there was a fellow US citizen in town who, it is fair to say, was more popularly received by his audience than his compatriot. Over 60 practitioners attended a sell-out meeting sponsored by Visioneering Technologies Inc (VTI) featuring optometrist Dr Thomas Aller as keynote speaker. Dr Aller shared the latest figures on the global myopia epidemic and gave an overview of the current evidence for effective intervention, including data from his own research using various techniques collated over almost 30 years in managing myopia progression.

Impact

Dr Aller first reviewed the various research studies into the prevalence of myopia and the associated risk of pathology. He reminded delegates that myopia is a leading cause of permanent blindness, with a four to five times increased risk of retinal detachment, two to five times increased risk of cataract and two to three times increased risk of glaucoma.¹ He quoted a pre-publication statistic from some work by Bullimore and Brennan showing that a one dioptre increase in myopia is associated with 67% increase in the presence of myopic maculopathy.² Restated, the slowing of myopia by the same amount should reduce the likelihood of myopic maculopathy by 40%.