Monday 4 June 2007

Ophthalmologist 2nd opinion

This afternoon we took Raphael to RHH to see an orthoptist and to get a second opinion from an ophthalmologist, who has specific experience in genetic and paediatric ophthalmology.

The orthoptist tested Raphael's vision with rather peculiar grey boards with black and white stripy lines on one side and a tiny hole in the middle to look through from behind. She span the board around till I felt dizzy and then stopped and looked though the little hole from behind to see if Raphael looked at the side of the board with the stripes. She repeated this with boards that had finer and finer stripes until she declared that Raphael's vision appears to be quite good; at least the vision out of his good eye is quite good anyway.

The ophthalmologist consultation was very interesting. The result from the pressure test on the 18/4/2007 was that the pressure in his right eye was 15mmHg (this is well within the safe range). He examined Raphael and said that Raphael had a coloboma in his right eye as well as the left. This right eye coloboma was small and very low down which meant that it would probably only effect the very top of Raphael's vision. He also recommended that Raphael's tear ducts only be probed and not flushed when they are examined in his coming surgery.

Topics covered:
  • Raphael's general vision
  • Colobomas
  • Eye pressures
  • Probing and flushing tear ducts at next surgery
  • What can be done to help his left eye
  • Retinal detachment
  • Critical developmental ages for eyes
  • Eye sizes
  • Optic nerve hypoplasia and micropthalmia
  • Type of eye specialists
  • potential treatments in the future

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