Amblyopia


What is an Amblyopia?

Amblyopia is poor vision in an eye. Usually occurs in an eye that did not develop normal sight during early childhood. It is sometimes called a “lazy eye”. The one eye develops good vision while the other does not. The eye with the poorer vision is then called amblyopic. This can be caused by several conditions.

How to treat the Amblyopia?
The best time to correct amblyopia is during infancy or early childhood. In order to have normal vision, it is important that both eyes develop equal vision. If a child has amblyopia and cannot use his or her eyes normally then the vision does not develop properly and may even decrease. After the first eight years of life, the visual system is normally fully developed and usually cannot be changed.

Patching is an effective method, where the dominant eye will be covered or patched and this will force the child to use the weaker eye. This allows the child to strengthen the weaker eye and eventually better their vision. Should amblyopia treatment not begin as early as possible, several problems can develop that can seriously affect vision from childhood into adulthood.

The amblyopic eye may develop a serious and permanent visual defect.

Depth perception (seeing in three dimension) may be lost, because good vision in both eyes is needed.

Should the stronger eye becomes diseased or injured, it can mean a lifetime of poor vision.