Macular Degeneration Treatments: How To Ward Off Age-Related Macular Degeneration And Retain Your Sight

Two years ago I told you about an important breakthrough in treating one of the most pervasive vision problems that affect us as we grow older: age-related macular degeneration (AMD).

Those over the age of 55 are at a high risk of developing age-related macular degeneration (AMD). That's why the 2001 breakthrough study was so significant; it provided very strong evidence to the effectiveness of an easy, inexpensive, and completely natural way to dramatically reduce age-related macular degeneration (AMD) risk.

It was refreshing to see the mainstream catching up with a protocol that complementary and alternative practitioners had been recommending for years. And now the mainstream has gone a step further with a new study that validates the 2001 research and puts its importance in clear perspective.

In short, this is information everyone over the age of 55 needs to be aware of.

The vision thing
To understand the results of the new research, we'll start with a quick review of the 2001 report from the Age-Related Eye Disease Study (AREDS); a major, ongoing US clinical trial sponsored by the National Eye Institute, one of the federal government's National Institutes of Health.

Over a period of eight and a half years, Age-Related Eye Disease Study researchers recruited almost 3,600 study participants. On average, the subjects were tracked for 6.3 years, with vision exams every six months. All of the participants were between the ages of 55 and 80, and approximately equal numbers of women and men.

Subjects were divided into categories depending on the state of their vision when recruited. For example: 'Category 4' patients already had age-related macular degeneration (AMD) at the beginning of the study, while 'Category 2' patients showed only borderline age-related macular degeneration (AMD) characteristics. Subjects in all categories were randomly assigned one of the following four regimens:

• Daily supplementation with antioxidants (500 mg vitamin C, 400 IUs of vitamin E, 15 mg beta carotene)
• Daily supplementation with zinc (80mg of zinc oxide and 2mg of cupric oxide)
• Daily supplementation with a combination of both antioxidants and zinc at the prescribed dosages
• Placebo

 After compiling the completed data in April 2001, researchers found that when compared to the placebo group, subjects in the antioxidant group had a 17 percent lower rate of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), and subjects in the zinc group had an impressive 21 percent lower incidence of age-related macular degeneration (AMD). But those in the group that combined antioxidants and zinc cut their risk of age-related macular degeneration (AMD) by a full 25 percent.

The study didn't assess the supplements' ability to prevent the initial development of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), but there are indications that it could help prevent the disease.

Major impact
The most recent round of research using Age-Related Eye Disease Study data comes from a team at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore in the US.

Applying the 2001 results to estimates of those in the US who are at risk of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), the Hopkins researchers concluded that over the next 5 years, well over a million people will develop advanced age-related macular degeneration (AMD) if they receive no preventive treatment. But if all 8 million at risk began to take supplements comparable to those in the Age-Related Eye Disease Study, more than 300,000 of them would prevent the onset of AMD and the vision loss associated with AMD.

In what has to be considered a remarkable mainstream endorsement of the preventive effects of supplements, the authors of the study told Reuters news service that the intake of these vitamins and nutrients by people at risk of age-related macular degeneration (AMD) should have 'a major impact on them, as well as on the public health.'

Risk & prevention
But who exactly is at risk of age-related macular degeneration (AMD)?

As the name of the disorder implies, age is the primary risk factor, with people over the age of 60 being in the greatest danger. Other risk factors include cigarette smoking and a history of immediate family members with age-related macular degeneration (AMD). Plus, prescription blood pressure drugs called ACE inhibitors actually create a greater age-related macular degeneration (AMD) risk than smoking does. Finally, women are also at somewhat more risk than men.

All of the supplements used in the Age-Related Eye Disease Study are very safe at the dosage levels listed above. As always, you should talk to your doctor before starting any supplementation programme, but for most people, the combination of antioxidants and zinc is an easy, relatively inexpensive way to fight off AMD and retain your sight.

And this is especially so if you're also getting a good amount of omega-3 fatty acids in your diet.

In a previous e-alert I told you about another study that examined the dietary information of more than 4,500 Age-Related Eye Disease Study subjects, aged 60-80 years. When researchers analysed the results of omega-3 fatty acid consumption through fish intake on subjects at risk of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), they found that those who ate one or more servings of fish each week (four ounces of tuna, or the same amount of broiled or baked fish) reduced their chances of developing 'wet AMD' (the most damaging type of age-related macular degeneration (AMD)) by about one-third, while subjects who consumed more than two weekly fish servings cut their chances of wet age-related macular degeneration (AMD) in half.

As US HSI Panellist Dr Allan Spreen, says: 'Don't believe anyone who tells you that there's no effective treatment for macular degeneration.'

Once again, we see the mainstream finally catching up to what HSI members have known for some time.