ANN ARBOR, Mich. (AP) — A degenerative eye disease slowly robbed Roger Pontz of his vision.
Diagnosed
with retinitis pigmentosa as a teenager, Pontz has been almost
completely blind for years. Now, thanks to a high-tech procedure that
involved the surgical implantation of a "bionic eye," he’s regained
enough of his eyesight to catch small glimpses of his wife, grandson and
cat.
"It’s awesome. It’s exciting — seeing something new every
day," Pontz said during a recent appointment at the University of
Michigan Kellogg Eye Center. The 55-year-old former competitive
weightlifter and factory worker is one of four people in the U.S. to
receive an artificial retina since the Food and Drug Administration
signed off on its use last year.
The facility in Ann Arbor has been the site of all four such surgeries since FDA approval. A fifth is
scheduled for next month.
Retinitis
pigmentosa is an inherited disease that causes slow but progressive
vision loss due to a gradual loss of the light-sensitive retinal cells
called rods and cones. Patients experience loss of side vision and night
vision, then central vision, which can result in near blindness.
Not
all of the 100,000 or so people in the U.S. with retinitis pigmentosa
can benefit from the bionic eye. An estimated 10,000 have vision low
enough, said Dr. Brian Mech, an executive with Second Sight Medical
Products Inc., the Sylmar, Calif.-based company that makes the device.
Of those, about 7,500 are eligible for the surgery.
The artificial
implant in Pontz’s left eye is part of a system developed by Second
Sight that includes a small video camera and transmitter housed in a
pair of glasses.
Images from the camera are converted into a
series of electrical pulses that are transmitted wirelessly to an array
of electrodes on the surface of the retina. The pulses stimulate the
retina’s remaining healthy cells, causing them to relay the signal to
the optic nerve.
The visual information then moves to the brain,
where it is translated into patterns of light that can be recognized and
interpreted, allowing the patient to regain some visual function.
When
wearing the glasses, which Pontz refers to as his "eyes," he can
identify and grab his cat and figure out that a flash of light is his
grandson hightailing it to the kitchen.
The visual improvement is
sometimes startling for Pontz and his wife, Terri, who is just as amazed
at her husband’s progress as he is.
"I said something I never thought I’d say: ‘Stop staring at me while I’m eating,’" Terri Pontz
said.
She
drives her husband the nearly 200 miles from tiny Reed City, Mich., to
Ann Arbor for check-ups and visits with occupational therapist Ashley
Howson, who helps Roger Pontz reawaken his visual memory and learn
techniques needed to make the most of his new vision.
At the
recent visit, Howson handed Pontz white and black plates, instructed him
to move them back and forth in front of light and dark backgrounds and
asked that he determine their color.
Back home, Terri Pontz helps her husband practice the techniques he learns in Ann Arbor.
For them, the long hours on the road and the homework assignments are a blessing.
"What’s it worth to see again? It’s worth everything," Terri Pontz said.
The
artificial retina procedure has been performed several-dozen times over
the past few years in Europe, and the expectation is that it will find
similar success in the U.S., where the University of Michigan is one of
12 centers accepting consultations for patients.
Candidates for
the retinal prosthesis must be 25 or older with end-stage retinitis
pigmentosa that has progressed to the point of having "bare light" or no
light perception in both eyes.
Dr. Thiran Jayasundera, one of two
physicians who performed the 4.5-hour surgery on Roger Pontz, is
scheduled to discuss his experiences with the retinal prosthesis process
during a meeting of the American Society of Cataract and Refractive
Surgery on Friday in Boston. He calls it a "game-changer."
Pontz agrees: "I can walk through the house with ease. If that’s all I get out of this, it’d be
great."
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Online:
http://www.kellogg.umich.edu
http://www.2-sight.com
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