The team had been working for years to develop the Bionic eye, a device that inserted electrodes in the retina of patients. Dianne Ashworth was the first patient to receive, in the month of may, the novelty at the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital.
The eye was linked last month in Bionics Institute in East Melbourne once the eye had recovered fully from the surgery. "Suddenly you can see a small Flash... was amazing", said Ashworth. "Everytime they encouraged appeared differently from my eye." The electrodes send electrical impulses to nerve cells in the eye, a process that occurs naturally in people with normal vision.
In the prototype, the electrodes are connected to a receiver that is positioned behind the patient, which then connects via a cable that is external to a unit in the laboratory. Researchers in the laboratory used the unit to control the information that is sent to the eye of Ashworth. This allows them to study how the brain reacts. This experiment will allow them to develop a vision processor to be able to create images using flashes of light.
Anthony Burkitt, director of Bionic Vision Australia, told reporters that "the result shows what can be achieved with a multidisciplinary team." The funding from the Australian Government was key in achieving this progress. "The Bionics Institute and surgeons at the Centre for Eye Research Australia also played an essential role in this achievement".The Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital is home to the Centre for Eye Research Australia, which, like the rest of the above-mentioned organizations, forms part of the Australian Consortium that investigates into the Bionic eye. Welcome to specialists and researchers under one roof allowed quickly apply the research to clinical care, say researchers.
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