Got floaters? Read on

This might read as a manifesto but it is least of my worries what it sounds like. If you have floaters/vitreous opacities in your vision and the quality of your life has been ruined then read on.

In the modern age when human beings have moved beyond sequencing their own genome and are now sequencing genome of thousands of other animals, you'd think that ophthalmology would be making advances on the most basics of human maladies of the eye. Do not get me wrong, many progresses have been made, especially on the diseases of retina such as macular degeneration. But what about the most basic of retinal degenerations namely lattice degeneration?

About 50% of eyes with retinal detachment have lattice degeneration in them. About 6% of American population has lattice degeneration. You'd think that ophthalmology has found a treatment safe enough to prevent development of retinal detachment (and possibly blindness!) in patients with lattice. Wrong. The most latest meta-analysis from Cochrane Reviews published in 2009 shows that we do not have any effective treatment for reducing the risk of retinal detachment (and possible blindness!) in patients who have asymptomatic lattice degeneration. Source :http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD003170.pub2/abstract

So what does lattice have to do with floaters? Well, if ophthalmology has not found a safe and effective preventive/prophylactic treatment for stopping detachment among asymptomatic lattice, how can you expect them to have found a safe and less invasive treatment for floaters? Right, they have not.

But Floater only Vitrectomy (FOV) has shown strong potential to rid you of your floaters. Want to see the faces of your loved ones without looking through worms, gunk, junk, critters, bugs and roaches? Look into FOV.

[Houman Vosoghi, MD]

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[lost_in_despair]

There are at least 8 peer-reviewed publications showing the effectiveness of FOV published in the last decade. Sure, these are retrospective studies, follow up periods are not that long, evidence is not extremely strong. But there is evidence. FOV is not pseudo-science. FOV is not homeopathic quackery. It is real. Preliminary evidence is there to show you how effective it is. World renowned surgeons such as Dr. Steve Charles, Dr. Sipperley, Dr. Akduman, Dr. Stalsman, Dr. CK Patel etc continue to perform FOVs! FOVs are done all over the world from US to Portugal to Germany to Singapore.

Are you willing to do something about your quality of life or are you willing to wait for a double blinded randomized controlled study (which probably would never be published)? Are you willing to get your eyes back or are you willing to give into false fear spread by general ophthalmologists?

Even if you do not want to get FOV, I urge you to raise your voice the next time you go and see your opthalmologist/optometrist. Tell them that there is SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE which shows that FOV is safe and effective. At least help those who want to get FOV by supporting them and leaving your arrogant opthalmologist dumbfounded by your knowledge on the topic.
Source: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=vitrectomy%20floaters

Regards,

A senior med student


P.S. Recently two members from floatertalk,yuku.com got amazing results from their FOV. So far their vision is crystal clear.

P.S.S yes, FOV has risks. You are guaranteed cataracts. There is risk of retinal detachment and that of endophthalmitis. But so are there similar risks associated with cataracts surgery. Nothing in medicine is risk free. Even taking a pill of aspirin can kill you due to hemorrhage.

[lost_in_despair]

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed?term=vitrectomy%20floaters

[lost_in_despair]

I will be getting FOV soon enough after graduation and before starting residency. Life has been hell. You CAN also do something about it.

[lost_in_despair]

My purpose of writing that was to leave some cues for patients. Ignore the spelling mistakes in opthalmologist which should be ophthalmologist. Signing off.