EC Eye bionic eye: better than the real thing? – EYESEEMAG

For the first time since it was established in 1948, the World Health Organisation (WHO) published their world vision report in October 2019. According to their statistics, 2.2 billion people around the world have a sight problem or some form of blindness. Of those, 217 million have a moderate to severe visual problem (less than 30% of the visual sharpness of perfect vision) and 36 million are blind (less than 5% sharpness of perfect vision). Amongst these 253 million people, more than 80% are older than 50.

Over the last few years, a lot of research has gone into tools that are capable of recovering or restoring vision, especially those affected by Age Related Macular Degeneration, the number one cause of visual deficiency in industrialised countries where 30% of the population is affected after the age of 75. Scientists have developed artificial retinas that aim to replace the photoreceptors in our eyes when they are damaged by the affliction.

Among the tools being developed, there is the Argus II by American company Second Sight, the Retina Implant by German company AG (who unfortunately stopped work on the project in 2019) and the IRIS II by French company Pixium Vision, all three of whom obtained the CE mark from European authorities. Placed either on the surface or underneath the retina, these tools are built from electrodes that stimulate the retinal neurones which carry information to the brain: the artificial implant stimulates the damaged retina, allowing the patient to perceive light, shapes and movement that they were not able to see before the surgery.

While all of these implants represent a major breakthrough in the scientific world, they are still far from being able to restore satisfactory sight. They do however, allow some patients to make short journeys unassisted, to discern a door or window, a pedestrian route or even lines on the ground, and in the best cases, after re-education and daily training, some implants allow the patient to read short sentences written in big white letters on a black background.