(August 4, 2015) Various sight recovery therapies are being developed by
companies around the world, offering new hope for people who are blind. But
little is known about what the world will look like to patients who undergo
those procedures.
A new University of Washington study seeks to answer that
question and offers visual simulations of what someone with restored vision
might see. The study concludes that while important advancements have been made
in the field, the vision provided by sight recovery technologies may be very
different from what scientists and patients had previously assumed.
In a paper published Aug. 3 in the journal Philosophical
Transactions B, UW researchers used simulations to create short videos that
mimic what vision would be like after two different types of sight recovery
therapies.
Lead author Ione Fine, a UW associate professor of
psychology, said the simulations are unprecedented.
“This is the first visual simulation of restored sight in
any realistic form,” she said. “Now we can actually say, ‘This is what the
world might look like if you had a retinal implant.’”
Fine said the paper aims to provide information about the
quality of vision people can expect if they undergo sight restoration surgery,
an invasive and costly procedure.
“This is a really difficult decision to make,” she said.
“These devices involve long surgeries, and they don’t restore anything close to
normal vision. The more information patients have, the better.”