Macular Hole
The back wall of our eyeball contains the vision machinery. It’s the “film” in the camera that captures light to form images. The macula is that part of the back wall responsible for seeing straight ahead to focus on words and people’s faces.
From aging of the eye or less commonly eye injury, one can develop a hole in the vision center, called a macular hole. A macular hole makes your focus blurry and lines wavy not straight. For example, words become blurry while reading and lines on the road turn wavy. Often people don’t notice small holes affecting their vision because the other “good” eye covers up for the “bad” eye. Only when one closes the good eye, say when rubbing it, does one notice the vision changes in the other eye from the macular hole. Eventually the macular hole grows bigger and becomes noticeable even with both eyes open. Usually macular holes affect only one eye, but 10% of the time both eyes develop holes.
The treatment for a macular hole is to close it. Small macular holes rarely will close on their own. There are few accepted treatments to close macular holes. One treatment involves injecting a medicine called Ocriplasmin into the eye. Another treatment is an outpatient eye surgery called vitrectomy. Your retina specialist can discuss treatment options and recommend the best treatment.
Once a hole is closed, vision can improve but usually not much if at all. But even if there is no improvement in vision, the now-closed hole can’t get bigger and make the vision worse.
Once a month everyone should check their central vision. It’s very easy to do. Just cover one eye with your hand and look at straight lines such as window blinds, letters on a page or lines on a road (not while driving), then repeat with the other eye. If the lines are wavy or blurry in an eye, you may have a macular hole or other problem. You should see an eye doctor and have them examine your macula. If your doctor sees something, he or she will refer you to a retina specialist who manages such issues and can help you maintain your best vision.
