How is retinopathy treated in alternative medicine?

Answer 1

Answer I was diagnosed with proliferative diabetic retinopathy 6 years ago. Mine was so severe that my course of treatment was laser treatments to cauderize the broken blood vessels. If you are in the early stages of diabetic retinopathy, please pay close attention to your blood sugars. Unfortunately for me, it was too late to save the blood vessels and retina, even with the treatments I still lost my vision.

Answer 2

Control of blood pressure blood glucose and lipids and smoking can delay the progression of retinopathy. In the later stage of retinopathy, surgical treatment like laser surgery or vitreous surgery is advised. Vascular endothelial growth factor has shown some promise for diabetic retinopathy.

Answer 3

Drugs to treat diabetic retinopathy
Intravitreal triamcinolone- this is a steroid, and works by reducing inflammation.
advantages: lasts 3 months, Sight improves a little 50%

disadvantages: 50% an eye pressure rise, 100% cataracts, more pressure rise in second eye, rise in blood sugar


Intravitreal avastin:
this blocks the effect of the 'growth factor' VEGF that causes leakage and new vessel growth
advantages: safer than IVT, lasts one month
disadvantages: usually needs repeated injections, slight increase in cataract development


Intravitreal macugen- This is a similar drug to avastin.
advantages: research shows greater benefits than avastin, lasting one month
disadvantages: repeat injections, slight increase in cataract development, very expensive


Good control of diabetes- is essential even with the new drugs.

However, all these drugs are likely to have a temporary benefit. So until a long lasting formulation arrives, they will almost certainly have to be given as well as laser. These are given as injections into the eye, and are more effective if edema is relatively new. All have a 1/1000 risk of very severe eye infection which can be blinding; there is 1/100 risk of other problems such as retinal tear.

Answer 4

Holistic medicine often treats eye disorders not only by promoting healing in the eyes but by strengthening the overall system on the physical, mental, and emotional levels.