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| Lelouch... |
 Posted: Wed Oct 21, 2009 12:08 am |
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[...]
Cataract: Its Cause and Cure
By W. H. Bates, M.D.
Cataract is a condition in which the lens becomes opaque. It is
commonly associated with advancing years, but may occur at any age. It
may also be congenital (present at birth). The opacities take many
different forms, and may occur in a hard or a soft lens. According to
the orthodox teaching the condition is incurable except by the removal
of the lens, although in the earlier stages it is sometimes
ameliorated by means of drops that expand the pupil and by glasses.
The text-books are full of statements to this effect.
Yet it is perfectly well known that cataract does sometimes recover
spontaneously. Many such cases are on record, and probably most
ophthalmologists who have been practicing for any length of time have
seen them. Fifteen or twenty years ago, when I was assistant surgeon
at the New York Eye and Ear Infirmary, I collected, at the request of
the executive surgeon, Dr. Henry D. Noyes, a large number of records
of such cases.
The removal of the lens, when it is soft, is usually accomplished by
the operation of needling, whereby the tissues are broken up so that
they may be absorbed. A hard lens is extracted through an opening at
the margin of the cornea, and the best results are believed to be
obtained when the opacity has become complete. Otherwise part of the
lens substance is liable to be left behind and cause trouble. Thus the
patient may be kept for years in a condition of semi-blindness.
The results of the operation are not always as satisfactory as might
be desired. A considerable proportion of patients regain what is
considered to be normal acuteness of vision with very strong glasses,
and the results are considered good when they become able to read
large print at the near-point and 20/50 at the distance. The patient
is obliged, usually to have two sets of glasses, one for distant
vision to replace the focusing power of the lost lens, and the other
for reading to compensate for the impairment of the accommodative
power which usually follows the operation.
This impairment of accommodative power is not due to the removal of
the lens, which has nothing to do with accommodation, but to the fact
that the patient strains so to see the muscles that control the shape
of the eyeball fail to act properly. In some cases it is regained,
after the patient becomes accustomed to the new situation, without
treatment, and in rare cases patients have become able to do without
glasses entirely, because the eyeball elongated sufficiently to
compensate for the loss of the lens.
I began to treat cataract by the operative method, because I did not
know anything better to do. Then I learned from Dr. James E. Kelly of
New York that incipient cases would yield to hygienic treatment. My
first inkling of the value of central fixation in such conditions came
to me through a patient who had incipient cataract in one eye and
hypermetropia (farsight) in the other. By the time the error of
refraction had been relieved the cataract had disappeared. After this
I had many similar experiences, but it did not occur to me that a ripe
cataract, or a congenital cataract, could be cured by this or any
other treatment.
In 1912, however, a girl of seventeen came to my clinic with the left
eye enucleated and a congenital cataract in the right. The left had
been operated upon for the same condition, and, having become
infected, was taken out to save the better eye. The latter having
recently become worse, the patient had come to have it operated upon.
Before performing the operation I thought it best to treat her by the
method of relaxation, for the purpose of improving the condition of
the eye as much as possible so that the operation might have a better
chance of success. To my surprise the vision improved and kept on
improving, until in three months it was normal and the cataract had
disappeared.
One day, some half a dozen years later, a lady, fifty-five years of
age, came to me to be cured of presbyopia (old-age sight). Her distant
vision in the right eye was 20/20, and in the left she had only light
perception. This was due to the presence, in this eye, of a mature
cataract. I began to treat her by the aid of the memory and
imagination for presbyopia, and, in order to prove to her the relation
between these mental faculties and the state of her vision, I asked
her to cover her right eye and note that she could not remember or
imagine a black period as well when it was open. She replied that she
could, and I said that it was impossible. She insisted that,
nevertheless, she did it. Thinking that at the near-point she would
realize the imperfection of the sight of the left eye more clearly
than at the distance, I brought the card closer and said:
"You cannot remember the period looking at this card with your good
eye covered."
She replied: "I can, and what is more, I can read the card," which she
did, both at two feet and at twenty.
This was naturally a shock to me. It did not seem to me possible that
a mature cataract could melt away in such a short time, but the
ophthalmoscope confirmed the statements of the patient. When she
remembered a period perfectly I could see the optic nerve and other
details of the eye-ground. Since then I have cured a great many
similar cases, one of the most remarkable having been reported in
'Better Eyesight' for June, 1920.
I had another shock when a few months ago a traumatic cataract began
to melt away under the influence of relaxation treatment. The patient
came to my clinic with an eye which had been completely blind for four
years from traumatic cataract complicated with detachment of the
retina. The opacity completely covered the pupil, and with the
ophthalmoscope no red reflex (light reflected from the retina) could
be seen. After a few treatments the patient became able to see
movements of his hand on the temporal side. Later he became able to
see the hand in all parts of the field. Now he is beginning to read.
Another case of the cure of traumatic cataract is reported in the
following article. These cures are very remarkable. A traumatic
cataract is one which follows an injury (trauma) to the lens, the
opacity being due largely to the formation of connective tissue in the
pupil, and, in advance of the event, I should have pronounced the cure
of such a condition impossible, although I had previously demonstrated
that when patients practice central fixation connective tissue is
absorbed in the optic nerve, retina and cornea. In the retina and
optic nerve the circulation can be seen to improve as the connective
tissue disappears, and I can only assume that this is the cause of its
disappearance.
Equally remarkable is the cure of diabetic cataract without relief of
the disease. A patient with such a cataract came to me on April 29,
1918, her vision being 10/200—in the right eye and 20/30—in the left.
She had been seen a year and a half previously by a well-known
ophthalmologist who had advised several operations, but, fortunately,
she had not submitted to them. By the aid of palming, swinging,
imagination and memory, her vision improved rapidly. On May 15 that of
the left eye was 20/70, while later it became normal. On May 22 the
vision of the right became normal temporarily. Since then she has had
sight relapses in the right eye, but few or none in the left. The
general diabetic condition has not changed, and it is remarkable that
when it is at its worst there is very little lowering of the vision.
It is quite evident from the foregoing facts that the cause of
cataract (other than traumatic) is strain, and I have found much other
evidence, both clinical and experimental, to the same effect. I have
not been able to produce cataract in a normal eye by strain, but in a
cataractous eye I have seen the opacity come and go according as the
mind of the patient was relaxed or under a strain. In one of these
cases the opacity was so dense that no red reflex could be seen.
Another doctor who was present looked at the eye and made the same
observation. I asked the patient to remember a swinging O perfectly
black, with a perfectly white center. This meant perfect relaxation,
and when she did it I saw some of the details of the retina and the
optic nerve, while the other doctor again confirmed my observation. I
then asked her to think of the O as stationary, with grey outlines and
a clouded center. This meant a great strain, and while she did it
neither I nor my colleague could see the red reflex. In experimental
animals I have produced cataract by operating upon the external
muscles in such a way as to increase their pressure, and have relieved
it by cutting these muscles.
____
Cataract Number
Better Eyesight
A monthly magazine devoted to the prevention and cure of imperfect
sight without glasses
Copyright, 1921, by the Central Fixation Publishing Company
Editor—W. H. Bates, M.D.
Publisher—Central Fixation Publishing Co.
$2.00 per year, 20 cents per copy
342 West 42nd Street, New York, N. Y.
Vol. IV - January 1921 - No. 1
____
[...] |
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| Mike Tyner... |
| Posted: Wed Oct 21, 2009 7:56 am |
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"Lelouch" <misa426 at (no spam) googlemail.com> wrote
[quote]Yet it is perfectly well known that cataract does sometimes recover
spontaneously. Many such cases are on record, and probably most
ophthalmologists who have been practicing for any length of time have
seen them.
[/quote]
Unfortunately, in modern times eye surgeons have succeeded in suppressing
all known reports of such a phenomenon. As a result, surgery is the only
treatment they will offer.
[quote]This impairment of accommodative power is not due to the removal of
the lens, which has nothing to do with accommodation, but to the fact
that the patient strains so to see the muscles that control the shape
of the eyeball fail to act properly.
[/quote]
However, in modern times eye surgeons have convinced the public of the
necessity for special "accommodating" and "multifocal" implants after
cataract surgery.
Because IOL manufacturers offer tropical island vacations and huge
kickbacks, surgeons secretly cut the muscle that controls accommodation
during cataract operations.
[quote]chance of success. To my surprise the vision improved and kept on
improving, until in three months it was normal and the cataract had
disappeared.
[/quote]
Isn't magic wonderful?
[quote]It is quite evident from the foregoing facts that the cause of
cataract (other than traumatic) is strain, and I have found much other
evidence, both clinical and experimental, to the same effect.
[/quote]
That's what the voices told me, too.
[quote]In experimental
animals I have produced cataract by operating upon the external
muscles in such a way as to increase their pressure,
[/quote]
I hate it when that happens.
[quote]and have relieved it by cutting these muscles.
[/quote]
If you say so.
-MT
Disclaimer: I have no training or experience that qualifies me to diagnose
the author's schizophrenia. I'm just saying... |
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