I'm Seeing Spots!

Maria Capelli
Chapter 3

     There are so many parts of the eye that are important for perceiving, but specifically I would like to talk about the retina’s role in perception. A few years ago, my mother’s retina detached from the rest of her eye. (p.55) The book says that usually a detached retina results from an injury to the eye, however my mother’s retina detached from the steroids she took many years ago to treat her asthma. Not many people knew then that steroids could cause retinas to detach and many people were prescribed them and had no complications or side effects until recently, like my mother. Since her retina was no longer attached to the pigment epithelium, she couldn’t undergo visual pigment regeneration because the opsin couldn’t reconnect to the retina. (p.55) She was blind in that eye until she has surgery to re-attach her retina. She was able to gain a small portion of her eyesight back, but not all of it due to the scarring the surgery left on her eye. She had one scar directly on top of the macula, a spot on top and a little bit of the surrounding area of the fovea. It resulted in a missing spot in the center of her vision. It was similar looking to macular degeneration as described in our book. (p.51) Luckily, the scar healed and the missing spot returned. About a year ago the retina in her other eye detached and surgery helped her regain most of the vision, but she still had some scarring. Below is what it would look like if there was scarring on your eye.