Article by:
Amelia Grant
Learning that you have age-related macular degeneration (AMD) can be extremely stressful for you and your family. You will have questions about the disease, how to treat it, and how to deal with vision loss. The greatest approach to dealing with vision loss is to learn new ways of doing things.
Visual Rehabilitation for Macular Degeneration
Visual rehabilitation can help you adjust and function more effectively with your residual eyesight, but it cannot restore permanently lost vision. Begin by explaining to your eye doctor the restrictions you are facing as a result of your vision loss.
The macular degeneration specialist can then prescribe optical devices like magnifiers. They may refer you to a vision rehabilitation facility, an eye clinic, or another organization where a low-vision therapist can assist you in adapting to new situations and making personalized recommendations for everyday tasks.
Use Your Other Senses
Listening to books on tape and CDs and practicing listening skills may appear tough at first, but it will become simpler with time. Most people with impaired vision are shocked to learn how much information they can get through their senses of hearing, touch, and even smell.
Hearing Improvement
Listening more implies remembering more. Most people never fully develop the ability to remember what they hear because it is unnecessary. Improving your listening abilities is paying full attention to what you hear rather than dividing your focus between what you see and hear.
You may improve your hearing skills in a variety of practical ways to aid in daily activities. For example, learning to recognize the sound of the refrigerator's hum can indicate that you have entered the kitchen. Hearing automobiles and other street noises shows an open window and where it is located.
Those with low vision may still acquire visual cues through their eyesight, but they will need to devote more and more of their attention to hearing. You will recall more of what you hear as you become more accustomed to listening to books, newspapers, and magazines on audio devices and using screen-reader software.
Using Touch
Those with impaired eyesight can learn to rely more on their sense of touch in a variety of practical ways. For example, choosing clothes from the closet will be easier if a person focuses on fabric textures and correlates them with mental images of certain garments.
If you have significant visual loss, using a cane or walker outdoors allows you to use your sense of touch to get more information about your surroundings. These "feelers" will sense changes in the pavement, objects' proximity, and stairs' existence. Even without a cane or walker, using your feet to navigate, particularly while climbing or descending stairs, can help you overcome your limited eyesight and avoid dangerous falls.
Peripheral Vision
People spend their entire lives relying heavily on central vision, and this tendency can be difficult to unlearn. However, persons suffering from macular degeneration are likely to have the best vision in their peripheral (side) field of vision. If you suffer from macular degeneration, you must make a concerted effort to identify and utilize this area as often as possible.
First, practice using your peripheral vision for several minutes at various times of day, resting your eyes in between intervals. Placing a brightly colored object directly in front of your eyes will help you find the best peripheral vision. Facing the thing, glance up, down, left, and right. After a few attempts, you'll most likely discover a location in the periphery area that is less fuzzy than the rest of the field.
Once you've identified this location, it will take time to develop a preference for it. You may need to turn your head slightly away from the object to view it, which may initially feel awkward. Learning to see with peripheral vision takes time, but this new way of looking becomes habitual with constant practice.