How is Diabetic Retinopathy Treated?

Your ophthalmologist will consider:

      Your age;
      Your medical history;
      Your lifestyle;
      How much your retina is damaged.

In many cases treatment is not necessary, but you will need to continue having regular eye exams. In other cases, treatment is recommended to stop the damage of diabetic retinopathy and improve sight whenever possible.

If you have diabetes, it's important to know that today, with improved methods of diagnosis and treatment, only a small percentage of people who develop retinopathy have serious vision problems. The best treatment for diabetic retinopathy is prevention with tight blood sugar control throughout the entire day. This is known to prevent and sometimes even reverse diabetic blood vessel changes. If this fails laser treatment of abnormal vessels is the primary method of treatment.

Laser surgery: This procedure is often helpful in treating diabetic retinopathy. A powerful beam of laser light is focused on the damaged retina. Small bursts of the laser's beam seal leaking retinal vessels to reduce macular edema. This is called photocoagulation.

For abnormal blood vessel growth (neovascularization), the laser beam bursts are scattered throughout the side areas of the retina. The small laser scars reduce the abnormal blood vessel growth and help bond the retina to the back of the eye, preventing retinal detachment.



In photocoagulation, a laser is focused on the retina to seal leaking blood vessels and reduce abnormal blood vessel growth.

Laser surgery may be performed in your ophthalmologist's office or an outpatient clinic. If diabetic retinopathy is detected early, laser surgery slows down vision loss. Even in the more advanced stages of the disease (proliferative retinopathy), it reduces the chance of severe visual impairment.

Cryotherapy: If the vitreous is clouded by blood, laser surgery cannot be used until the blood settles or clears. In some cases of bleeding into the vitreous, cryotherapy, or freezing, of the retina may help shrink the abnormal blood vessels.

Vitrectomy. In advanced proliferative diabetic retinopathy, the ophthalmologist may recommend a vitrectomy. This microsurgical procedure is performed in the operating room. Vitrectomy removes the blood-filled vitreous and replaces it with a clear solution.

About 70% of vitrectomy patients notice an improvement in sight after surgery. Sometimes the ophthalmologist may wait from several months up to a year to see if the blood clears on its own, before going ahead with a vitrectomy.

Retinal repair: If scar tissue detaches the retina from the back of the eye, severe sight loss or blindness can result unless surgery is performed to reattach the retina.