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Comment by cjaackie | Hacker News Reader

The one thing I maybe missed, is there anything that can be done to reduce the risk of developing Age-Related Macular Degeneration?

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I don't know, probably not. My dad has wet macular degeneration, and it's treated with injections into the eyeball every few months. The treatment works well, but timing the injections is tricky. Too often and the side-effects become significant. Not often enough and you can get a retinal bleed, which my dad did. Fortunately he regained most of the vision lost in the bleed, and now they've increased the frequency of the injections. He'd probably be blind by now without them. Not to mention the cataract surgery and the glaucoma...

It isn't carrots.

Lutein may prevent or slow it. It's the best general eye supplement I've found too.

I was prescribed vit a palmitate, lutein, and DHA. The vit prescribed was a high dose, like 10k iu per day. I cut back on that dose, I'm going blind but I also need to consider my general health. I have ushers syndrome, not md, but it's a retinal disease (retinitis pigmentosa).

To be clear, this is prescribed as a "we can't do anything else for you" thing, since there is no cure for RP. This may or may not actually help.

Sorry to hear that. Given that it's genetic only something like Crispr could perhaps one day help.

They're also working on mRNA treatments, there is the LUNA study currently underway. Unfortunately I have a rare variant that isn't covered by this treatment. I'm hopeful but alas I live my life like treatment isn't coming because it's probably not.

Wearing sunglasses apparently helps. You just need to make sure they have a proper UV rating, a lot of the cheap ones you get online don't do a good job of blocking UV.

Those that fail to block uv can leave your eyes exposed to more UV than if you were not wearing any sun glasses.

My layperson understanding is this happens because the mechanism that dilates the pupil responds to visible light so glasses cause it to open wider, but if they don’t block UV then you end up with more UV exposure than if you didn’t wear anything

Years ago I saw on TV a report where people bought several sunglasses sold in the street in Brazil and compared to the expensive brands and they all cut UV quite effectively.

Not that I would trust national TV test methodologies and risk my vision but it was a curious result.

Off topic but in the same vein: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judgment_of_Paris_(wine)

I find that surprising since most plastics you would make glasses from should block uv.

Most plastics are transparent to UVA, which is like 90% of UV that reaches earth's surface. They only start absorbing at higher UV frequencies. That's why sunglasses have dedicated UV ratings. You can bring your sunglasses to basically any optometrist and test how well they block UV. It takes 20 seconds and they'll probably do it for free.

That makes sense, thanks.

Glass protects from UV bellow 350nm, which leaves 350nm-400nm band open. So additional coating is required. I might be wrong but such factors as glass thickness and the radiation intensity should be also accounted for. Every physical object is mostly an empty space ...

Visual range goes to 380. I'm skeptical that light at 350 is really doing much damage to my eyes.

It actually does not not matter what you see. You can't see UV, and it harms your eyes. What you need is a protection from UV band, and that is exactly what your eye can't see.

Stop producing AGE's. Stop eating sugar.

Advanced glycation end-product proteins or lipids that become glycated as a result of exposure to sugars

Eat astaxanthin, lycopene, lutein or similar yellow, orange and red pigments that plants use to protect themselves from sunlight.

I believe fish oil / omega 3 helps.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK11888/

Sadly I think this may be a worldwide tendency. Source: was a child in the 90s in Eastern Europe.

Don't smoke.

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