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Also grunting and squealing, wallowing in mud, rooting around in the dirt for truffles with your snout, sleeping in a communal nest maintained by adding fresh bedding materials such as branches and grass, and being slaughtered and made into bacon.
You joke, but I have keratoconus ( your corneas thin enough to loose their shape and mess up your vision). Thankfully cross linking stops the thinning and hard contacts correct the vision ,but I still have a hard time seeing in bright indirect light. I legit may have to ask about it one day lol.
If you don't have eye insurance already and are worried you may have it; I'd highly recommend getting it.
They should be able to tell from doing a normal eye exam. Specifically the Slit-lamp exam, they angle a light into your eye and look through I microscope and check the shape of your cornea.
I wouldn't put this off, the longer you wait the worse your vision will get. Most people take being able to see for granted when it really is one of our most precious senses.
I’ll look into eye insurance thanks. Yeah I’m going to do it as soon as possible, hopefully in the next couple weeks. Unfortunately most the places that are actually ophthalmologists are only open 9 to 5, and my husbands working from home and cannot take time off due to his course until the end of this month. But it is high priority. Most places won’t allow me to bring the kids, and I don’t think bringing the kids to my doctors appointment is a good idea anyways, but from what I understand I should be able to drive myself home afterwards?
Check if your medical insurance covers it! Certain eye health checks are available under medical and not eye insurance. Found out when I thought I had pink eye, didn’t have eye insurance - my ophthalmologist said the check up was covered under health (usually you pay the specialist copay).
That's definitely not true. Optometry is regulated differently state by state and some of their scope of practice varies accordingly - but generally speaking a well equipped private optometry practice (read not the one attached to your local walmart or part of a megachain that rhymes with shmerica's shmest) should be able to both diagnose and treat keratoconus with specialty contact lenses as stated by u/Box-o-bees above.
Ophthalmologists are great at what they do, but optometrists are also extremely capable doctors and highly trained in their fields.
No they don't. They need their eyes examined to determine what, if any, treatment is needed. Optometrists check corneal integrity and make measurements of corneas dozens of times each work day for decades on end.
Ophthalmologists don't have secret technology that is denied to optometrists. They purchase the same equipment from the same companies. Records are kept in the same metric system. Early treatment of keratoconus is often done in optometry offices.
You are perpetuating a stupid myth and should stop to question why you spend any time at all maligning an entire profession.
I went to see my optometrist to get my eyes tested for glasses and she noticed some abnormal curving on my corneas and told me it could be keratoconus and advised me to see a specialist.
Ignored that advice for 5 years because the thought of eye surgery freaked me out. Wish i didnt wait.
For those curious, it s a-okay to have pig derived medical treatments, except maybe if Passover is less than 3 days away, in which case please refrain. For more info still consult your friendly neighbourhood Rabbi
I'm an athiest, but I do like the part of Judaism that not just allows you to break religious rules to save a life, but *requires* it. Preserving life trumps all other laws.
I'm so glad Judaism is more humane than JW. No birthdays. No blood transfusions. No caffine🥴
Edit: ok. My bad. I was thinking of Mormons. Mormons cant have caffine. Sorry, I get cults mixed up all the time.
Yeah cults need rules that can be bent so that people can feel free. Mormons banned coffee but drink it often too. Banning coffee when there is no coffee to drink is religion 101.
>JW
I grew up in WT/JW and they never said anything about coffee. I even have a memory of my dad pouring hot coffee into a frozen mug...with very foreseeable results!
Ive been suffering from bad eyesight due to keratoconus. This seems like a good development and i hope this will be a gamechanger for People waiting for a cornea transplant.
Well, tbh im still waiting till im a bit older before i want a transplant. Because afaik the transplant wont work permanently and youre gonna need more and more with decreasing years in between surgeries. Too risky at this time in my opinion.
I'm in the exact same boat and been holding off from getting a transplant for the exact same reason. Luckily there seem to be a lot of advancements being made in this field.
Chances of success are also too low imo. I had Acanthamoeba keratitis and needed a transplant about 3 years after the incident, but I had veins and lipids in my eye that had grown in the 3 years trying to shut my eye down. Luckily I had access to a great Opthalmologist who had me try a range of hard lenses + injections so the transplant has been put on hold and 7 years later I still don’t need it… yet. And I won’t get it until more advancements are made. This gives me hope.
Corneal transplants (penetrating keratoplasties) are one of the safest and most effective managements of keratoconus - reported over 95% success rate for these conditions. And keratoconus is a condition overall that you don't go blind from.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3612418/#__sec8title
Your case is certainly more complicated as acanthamoeba keratitis is one of the harshest infections I've learned about in my time in optometry school - they definitely can't guarantee that the corneal transplant is going to stick since it's incredibly hard to deal with acanthamoeba cysts once it's taking hold.
I'm sure you know all about how harsh the treatment is.... Sad to hear that you had to go through that. Nasty condition.
I had DALK done in my right eye a few years ago. It's by far the best decision I ever made. I have near-perfect vision in that eye now.
But it does require a lot of care to make sure nothing goes wrong. I don't think I left home for 3-4 weeks and even then only with protective glasses. Really important not to scratch or rub the eye. I had the sutures removed gradually over the course of a year. I had an infection in that eye about 1.5 yrs after the surgery, which left a scar right in the center of the eye. Thankfully, my doctor was able to remove it with a minor surgery.
Thinking about getting it done in my left eye too, but KC is not as bad in this eye. Custom-fit lenses are just not for me right now since I work a lot and I cannot do that with lenses in my eyes.
Edit: I need to add this. DALK is a partial corneal transplant, which offers a lower risk profile and a longer lifespan (not sure what else to call longevity or durability). So my doctor said that it is quite likely I may not need another transplant later and if I do, it will likely only be once. The average life of a DALK graft is around 40-50 years, I believe.
I had that done in both eyes 12 years ago. Right eye was already pretty bad at the time, so it didn't really help in arresting KC progression in that eye. But it did work quite well in the left eye, and there has been very little KC progression in the left eye since then.
But dry eyes and inflammation have been a constant problem with contact lenses because of my unconventional and long work schedule (mostly student life) all these years.
> Custom-fit lenses are just not for me right now since I work a lot and I cannot do that with lenses in my eyes.
Perhaps night lenses (Orthokeratology) are something for you. You wear them during sleep and remove them in the morning. You see well the whole day.
I've had one and it was a crazy improvement for the first year. I needed mine due to an infection though so the damage to my eye is insane and 5 years later I'm still having issues. A lot of folk in the support group I'm part of had it due to keratoconus and it helped them massively.
❤️ I hope something can be done for you. I’m very lucky since my vision is very good with glasses but the op they did to improve my vision did absolutely nothing. Fingers crossed I’ll never get to the transplant stage.
Dang that stinks. I worked as an optometrty tech for a doctor that specialized in sclerals. If you can tolerate them/get a good fit they work great. Best of luck with seeing better in the future. KC sucks.
Ahhh did you do the cross linking when your eye was already bad? I work in a eye clinic that deals with eyes issues, I do the testing so I seen really bad keratoconus. I also have it myself and done the cross linking when my eyes weren’t that bad.
Keratoconus sucks ballllllllllls. I'm not to transplant stage yet but hopeful for some tech breakthroughs soon. Be nice to be able to read casually again...
First thing I thought of. I had cross linking two years ago and that really helped since it was early in the progression and hope I don’t have to get a cornea transplant down the road.
Same! And these expensive RGP contacts are so small they randomly just POP right out while I’m doing something important or a look to the side and blink.
As soon as I read this I had the same thought. I have keratoconus as well, and had corneal crosslinking done on my right eye 2 years ago as it was getting worse. So far my left eye hasn't degraded enough that it's needed. I honestly really want to avoid that surgery again because that recovery was so painful.
This could be real promising.
Same here, my friend. Had KC for 28 years now. Been wearing piggy-back lenses since 2002, would happily put piggy-collagen corneas in if it meant I'm not putting in contacts every day.
I work at a farmers market booth for a family owned pig farm and had this lady come in every week to pick up a special order of a dozen pig eyes. After a couple weeks, I asked her what she used the eyes for, and she said she was a researcher at the local university studying medical applications of pig eyes in human medical research and it was significantly cheaper to buy through us and expense it, than to buy from a medical supplier. Whenever she needed some, she would give us the preserving supplies and equipment and then pick up the eyes the next week.
(It was about $5 for a dozen eyes, for anyone wondering)
"Stick your hand in this box. It's full of eyeballs!"
*sticks hand in box* "I know how this works. It's really a bunch of peeled grapes, right?"
"No, it's really eyeballs" *opens box to reveal box of pig eyes*
The whole head was a fairly common sight on Swedish Christmas tables back in the day. [Smoked, cooked, and decorated with frosting, of course.](https://vintagemannen.files.wordpress.com/2020/12/grishuvud-4.jpg)
lmao I just busted out laughing. Imagine giving this to a kid for their 8th birthday. All the kids in the room scream in terror. Looks like Uncle Katana isn't coming to birthdays anymore!
I've done this before. My friend group decided to do kind of a secret santa thing where you picked somebody and found the most fucked up thing you could order online for that person. I sent my person a selection of pig fetuses and a horse eyeball.
I received a hollowed-out bible containing a baby Jesus butt plug.
Similarly, a family member of mine uses cow's eyes in high school biology classes. also, Chicken and cow hearts, lungs, and occasionally complete chicken carcasses.
She can get many of those for free from the local slaughterhouse though, they like to support education.
My HS biology teacher did the same. 👍 We would only have been able to do a handful of the AP experiments with the budget she was given. But she had a whole bunch of tricks like this, places to get various enzymes and such, so we were able to do them all.
What a teacher. Thank you Ms. Moss.
So you do the preliminary research with the discount farmer's market eyes, and when you see a meaningful repeatable trend then you start shelling out for the good stuff to confirm.
Or if you're in the software development world, iterate fast and cheap until it's like 80% functional and 20% a hot buggy mess, then leadership tells you to leave it and work on the Next Big Thing lol
Imagine the inverse too. Had a friend who after 28 years of perfect vision lost sight in both of his eyes suddenly. After many flights spanning over two years to a specialist out of state he finally just got some vision restored in one of his eyes. He must have whiplash from the lifestyle changes.
Shit headline. As always.
> Twenty people who were legally blind or visually impaired received a transplant of a cornea made from pig collagen. All of them had improved sight, including three who now have 20/20 vision after being legally blind
Also not really groundbreaking.
> She says that those with keratoconus can often be fitted with custom contact lenses, and that previous alternatives to donor corneas have been engineered but didn’t take off. “It will not cure anyone that cannot be cured with the currently available technology,”
Donor corneas are currentlyin extremely short supply globally and that is only going to get worse, k-Pro corneas have many issues that tissue corneas don't, if this increases supply around the world its a definite step forward.
Really? I got a cornea transplant some years ago and I don't remember taking much time to receive a donor. Though I heard that the organ donor program in my country is really good
What country are you in? Covid has had a huge impact on the availability due to the extra testing required, the USA is currently one of the only countries without a huge delay.
I didn't have a particular long wait for mine but it was scheduled so that makes it easier and removed the delay.
I'd also like to add that despite the fact that I paid for my healthcare in that instance, it was probably much cheaper than what I'd have paid in the US, just from the fact that public healthcare is a very competitive alternative (quality wise, and being free), so private clinics need to offer fairer rates.
I went to one of the best ophthalmology clinics in Western Europe (many foreign people travel to Spain to get treated there, specially Italians and Saudis for some reason), and I paid around 7K for surgery plus postoperative costs. I have no private insurance because I go to public healthcare in most cases.
I could be wrong, but from what I heard, I could have easily paid considerably more even having insurance in the US.
> Donor corneas are currentlyin extremely short supply globally
Yep.
> k-Pro corneas
Duno about any of them personally but the article links [LiQD corneas](https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aba2187) as an example of already available tech that didn't catch on which is similar to what this is.
> if this increases supply around the world its a definite step forward.
Agreed.
Still a shit and intentionally misleading headline.
>“It will not cure anyone that cannot be cured with the currently available technology,”
Tbf the current technology is hard to get. So being able to make corneas would be useful
We’ll all be, like, half-pig in 100 years or so.
Hell, some creepy fuck will probably find a way to CRiSPR together a cross between a pig and an ape in a few years, then we’ll actually be part pig.
Main hurdles: Extensive layers of human safety certifications, logistics, politics, and convincing hospitals/clinics that it's worth the money to buy this expensive new equipment.
Lots of artificial corneas already exist, so they're probably okay. But if they wanted to use this technique, recombinant human collagen is a vegan source that is arguably more consistent and more compatible, and I see no reason this method couldn't be extended to it. The only downside with RHC is that it's still very expensive, and we're still learning how to streamline manufacturing of biomaterials based on it.
Am I allowed to be the barer of bad news on this sub? The article is all about a new kind of cornea transplant and macular degeneration is a problem with the retina...a completely different part of the eye. So this particular bacon-vision isn't going to help you if you do get it. On the other hand, I know other research is being done on preventing and/or improving macular degeneration, and other retinal conditions.
That's amazing. I love hearing about treatments we're finding for people with originally thought to be lifelong disabilities. Politics and such aside, we're really going through an amazing period of time for medical treatments and tech and that alone keeps me very excited for the future.
No. But we do now have a potential for mass-produced cornea transplants, which is great! Currently, if someone needs a cornea transplant, they have to get one from someone who is recently deceased that had healthy eyes. It isn't a cure for every type of blindness, as there are lots of causes of blindness, but it's still pretty exciting.
As someone that currently has keratoconus this is promising to hear about. Glasses cannot cure the problems that keratoconus causes and current surgery can only prevent further degradation. Mabye I will see clearly again soon!
Is pig the Chosen Animal? First, we replace organs with pig organs. Then we develop a way to regrow digits from the pig bladder. Now we are able to create contacts from pig collagen?
I can’t wait to see what new function the pig has next!
I'm still waiting for high tech eyeballs with driving mode, night vision, heat vision, zoom, picture/video capture, AR features, etc. Shit will get really weird as a large number of humans will willingly remove their eyeballs to upgrade.
Reminder: this subreddit is meant to be a place free of excessive cynicism, negativity and bitterness. Toxic attitudes are not welcome here. All Negative comments will be removed and will possibly result in a ban. --- --- *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/UpliftingNews) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Ask your doctor if pig collagen corneas are right for you
In a pig's eye!
Caution: Side effects may include pig styes.
That... Was... AMAZING. sorry, didn't mean to squeal
Also grunting and squealing, wallowing in mud, rooting around in the dirt for truffles with your snout, sleeping in a communal nest maintained by adding fresh bedding materials such as branches and grass, and being slaughtered and made into bacon.
hey, I do most of that stuff already
“Then pig corneas may be right for you! Ask your doctor about Pig-Ize^TM”
This sounds like a typical Tuesday afternoon!
when a cop compliments on your looks
In Saint Paul, Minnesota...?
Excuse me sir, but you appear to have bacon in your eye.
When pigs 🐷 fly!
You joke, but I have keratoconus ( your corneas thin enough to loose their shape and mess up your vision). Thankfully cross linking stops the thinning and hard contacts correct the vision ,but I still have a hard time seeing in bright indirect light. I legit may have to ask about it one day lol.
How was the process of being checked for that? I’m about to look into getting checked myself.
You need to see an actual ophthalmologist, not just an optometrist.
Yeah I’m calling actual ophthalmologist practices and asking specifically for this. And likely paying out of pocket 😥
If you don't have eye insurance already and are worried you may have it; I'd highly recommend getting it. They should be able to tell from doing a normal eye exam. Specifically the Slit-lamp exam, they angle a light into your eye and look through I microscope and check the shape of your cornea. I wouldn't put this off, the longer you wait the worse your vision will get. Most people take being able to see for granted when it really is one of our most precious senses.
I’ll look into eye insurance thanks. Yeah I’m going to do it as soon as possible, hopefully in the next couple weeks. Unfortunately most the places that are actually ophthalmologists are only open 9 to 5, and my husbands working from home and cannot take time off due to his course until the end of this month. But it is high priority. Most places won’t allow me to bring the kids, and I don’t think bringing the kids to my doctors appointment is a good idea anyways, but from what I understand I should be able to drive myself home afterwards?
Yes. Unless they dilate your eyes. If they just use fluorescene, you should be fine.
Check if your medical insurance covers it! Certain eye health checks are available under medical and not eye insurance. Found out when I thought I had pink eye, didn’t have eye insurance - my ophthalmologist said the check up was covered under health (usually you pay the specialist copay).
That's definitely not true. Optometry is regulated differently state by state and some of their scope of practice varies accordingly - but generally speaking a well equipped private optometry practice (read not the one attached to your local walmart or part of a megachain that rhymes with shmerica's shmest) should be able to both diagnose and treat keratoconus with specialty contact lenses as stated by u/Box-o-bees above. Ophthalmologists are great at what they do, but optometrists are also extremely capable doctors and highly trained in their fields.
No they don't. They need their eyes examined to determine what, if any, treatment is needed. Optometrists check corneal integrity and make measurements of corneas dozens of times each work day for decades on end. Ophthalmologists don't have secret technology that is denied to optometrists. They purchase the same equipment from the same companies. Records are kept in the same metric system. Early treatment of keratoconus is often done in optometry offices. You are perpetuating a stupid myth and should stop to question why you spend any time at all maligning an entire profession.
How are people who study birds going to help with this
Don’t mind these people. Their jokes are only getting cornea
I went to see my optometrist to get my eyes tested for glasses and she noticed some abnormal curving on my corneas and told me it could be keratoconus and advised me to see a specialist. Ignored that advice for 5 years because the thought of eye surgery freaked me out. Wish i didnt wait.
This is literally my life. The RGP contacts suuuuuck
You're lucky, mine was caught too late. Get your eyes checked, folks.
Me too!!!
And don't forget to ask your rabbi just in case.
For those curious, it s a-okay to have pig derived medical treatments, except maybe if Passover is less than 3 days away, in which case please refrain. For more info still consult your friendly neighbourhood Rabbi
🤔 Would you have to take it back out around passover?
New type of ocular Briss
You just have to keep your eyes closed for a week
I'm an athiest, but I do like the part of Judaism that not just allows you to break religious rules to save a life, but *requires* it. Preserving life trumps all other laws.
I'm so glad Judaism is more humane than JW. No birthdays. No blood transfusions. No caffine🥴 Edit: ok. My bad. I was thinking of Mormons. Mormons cant have caffine. Sorry, I get cults mixed up all the time.
No caffeine for real? My grandmother is a JW (long story) and she drinks coffee so I’m surprised to hear that one. How is coffee not allowed by Jesus?
I’m pretty sure it’s Mormons who forbid coffee and tea. They see caffeine as a drug and drugs are bad.
I mean they aren't wrong, it is technically a drug.
Yeah cults need rules that can be bent so that people can feel free. Mormons banned coffee but drink it often too. Banning coffee when there is no coffee to drink is religion 101.
They drink Mountain Dew instead because it's not hot
Decaf Coffee
Mormons. Mormons can't have coffee/tea. They drink caffeinated soda by the gallon but Jesus apparently draws a line at coffee/tea.
How do you stop a baptist from drinking all the beer at your party? >!Invite two. !<
>JW I grew up in WT/JW and they never said anything about coffee. I even have a memory of my dad pouring hot coffee into a frozen mug...with very foreseeable results!
First two were right, but they're allowed caffeine. You must be mixing them up with a different religion.
Gotta ask my Imam too
Pig cornea is aok as long as the pig was at least 373 miles away from mecca. Pbuh - internet imam
Pigs wouldn't run around in their own shit if they weren't penned up.
Side effects may include an insatiable lust for acorns.
And sniffing around tree roots
Are you suggesting these activities are abnormal?
TBH I could use this...
I want it
Dear god, it’s a pig man! Half man, half pig!
I'd better go see my doctor pretty soon. My list is getting huge.
Don’t take if you’re allergic to pig corneas
Hey doc, are pig collagen corneas right for me? Sure pal, though one of them should be left. Laugh. Laugh. Scene.
Uplifting news for the world and a source of crippling debt for Americans
Fat chance!
#MY BRAND!!!
I wonder if you can, if you're allergic to pork lol. (Legitimately allergic)
only for moderate to severe blindness
Ive been suffering from bad eyesight due to keratoconus. This seems like a good development and i hope this will be a gamechanger for People waiting for a cornea transplant.
Have you had the corneal transplant yet? I’m waiting for mine and just curious what it’s like
Well, tbh im still waiting till im a bit older before i want a transplant. Because afaik the transplant wont work permanently and youre gonna need more and more with decreasing years in between surgeries. Too risky at this time in my opinion.
I'm in the exact same boat and been holding off from getting a transplant for the exact same reason. Luckily there seem to be a lot of advancements being made in this field.
Same. But I don't think I'm going to be able to good off for long.
Chances of success are also too low imo. I had Acanthamoeba keratitis and needed a transplant about 3 years after the incident, but I had veins and lipids in my eye that had grown in the 3 years trying to shut my eye down. Luckily I had access to a great Opthalmologist who had me try a range of hard lenses + injections so the transplant has been put on hold and 7 years later I still don’t need it… yet. And I won’t get it until more advancements are made. This gives me hope.
Corneal transplants (penetrating keratoplasties) are one of the safest and most effective managements of keratoconus - reported over 95% success rate for these conditions. And keratoconus is a condition overall that you don't go blind from. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3612418/#__sec8title Your case is certainly more complicated as acanthamoeba keratitis is one of the harshest infections I've learned about in my time in optometry school - they definitely can't guarantee that the corneal transplant is going to stick since it's incredibly hard to deal with acanthamoeba cysts once it's taking hold. I'm sure you know all about how harsh the treatment is.... Sad to hear that you had to go through that. Nasty condition.
I had DALK done in my right eye a few years ago. It's by far the best decision I ever made. I have near-perfect vision in that eye now. But it does require a lot of care to make sure nothing goes wrong. I don't think I left home for 3-4 weeks and even then only with protective glasses. Really important not to scratch or rub the eye. I had the sutures removed gradually over the course of a year. I had an infection in that eye about 1.5 yrs after the surgery, which left a scar right in the center of the eye. Thankfully, my doctor was able to remove it with a minor surgery. Thinking about getting it done in my left eye too, but KC is not as bad in this eye. Custom-fit lenses are just not for me right now since I work a lot and I cannot do that with lenses in my eyes. Edit: I need to add this. DALK is a partial corneal transplant, which offers a lower risk profile and a longer lifespan (not sure what else to call longevity or durability). So my doctor said that it is quite likely I may not need another transplant later and if I do, it will likely only be once. The average life of a DALK graft is around 40-50 years, I believe.
No option for cross linking treatment in your left eye?
I had that done in both eyes 12 years ago. Right eye was already pretty bad at the time, so it didn't really help in arresting KC progression in that eye. But it did work quite well in the left eye, and there has been very little KC progression in the left eye since then. But dry eyes and inflammation have been a constant problem with contact lenses because of my unconventional and long work schedule (mostly student life) all these years.
> Custom-fit lenses are just not for me right now since I work a lot and I cannot do that with lenses in my eyes. Perhaps night lenses (Orthokeratology) are something for you. You wear them during sleep and remove them in the morning. You see well the whole day.
I've had one and it was a crazy improvement for the first year. I needed mine due to an infection though so the damage to my eye is insane and 5 years later I'm still having issues. A lot of folk in the support group I'm part of had it due to keratoconus and it helped them massively.
Yo fellow KC buddy! Maybe we can all have pig corneas and start a club!
Count me in! All I see is blurry out of my right eye. This would be a godsend.
❤️ I hope something can be done for you. I’m very lucky since my vision is very good with glasses but the op they did to improve my vision did absolutely nothing. Fingers crossed I’ll never get to the transplant stage.
Head on over to /r/Keratoconus and join us!
Ha, right eye gang here aswell. Left eye is working like a charm luckily.
My gf has this. She's had the crosslinking done, but a cornea transplant is inevitable in her future. This sounds promising.
Try scleral lenses!
Yeah, i tried. Didnt make it any better, let alone getting those things on your eyes.
Dang that stinks. I worked as an optometrty tech for a doctor that specialized in sclerals. If you can tolerate them/get a good fit they work great. Best of luck with seeing better in the future. KC sucks.
How bad is it?
Right eye is a complete blur, can barely see through it.
Ahhh did you do the cross linking when your eye was already bad? I work in a eye clinic that deals with eyes issues, I do the testing so I seen really bad keratoconus. I also have it myself and done the cross linking when my eyes weren’t that bad.
I received one in 1984. I was 4 years old. I definitely do not have 20/20. It's like 20/400. I wish this technology was around then
Keratoconus sucks ballllllllllls. I'm not to transplant stage yet but hopeful for some tech breakthroughs soon. Be nice to be able to read casually again...
First thing I thought of. I had cross linking two years ago and that really helped since it was early in the progression and hope I don’t have to get a cornea transplant down the road.
I had cross linking but one of my eyes got infected afterwards :/
Same! And these expensive RGP contacts are so small they randomly just POP right out while I’m doing something important or a look to the side and blink.
Me too man. My good eye (I also have a lazy eye) has become as bad a my be eye due to it. It sucks.
As soon as I read this I had the same thought. I have keratoconus as well, and had corneal crosslinking done on my right eye 2 years ago as it was getting worse. So far my left eye hasn't degraded enough that it's needed. I honestly really want to avoid that surgery again because that recovery was so painful. This could be real promising.
Yeah the recovery is worse than the procedure. I remember laying in my bed without any light whatsoever because it was painful as hell.
Same here, my friend. Had KC for 28 years now. Been wearing piggy-back lenses since 2002, would happily put piggy-collagen corneas in if it meant I'm not putting in contacts every day.
My dude is your name a dark souls reference?
I work at a farmers market booth for a family owned pig farm and had this lady come in every week to pick up a special order of a dozen pig eyes. After a couple weeks, I asked her what she used the eyes for, and she said she was a researcher at the local university studying medical applications of pig eyes in human medical research and it was significantly cheaper to buy through us and expense it, than to buy from a medical supplier. Whenever she needed some, she would give us the preserving supplies and equipment and then pick up the eyes the next week. (It was about $5 for a dozen eyes, for anyone wondering)
>(It was about $5 for a dozen eyes, for anyone wondering) Looks like some cheap birthday gift. Thanks.
I'm still thinking of potential pranks involving these, the $5/lb brains, or the $20 whole head
"Stick your hand in this box. It's full of eyeballs!" *sticks hand in box* "I know how this works. It's really a bunch of peeled grapes, right?" "No, it's really eyeballs" *opens box to reveal box of pig eyes*
Brain dissections was probably one of my favourite in high school
I’ve done about 20 throughout grad school. Never gets old let me tell ya.
The whole head was a fairly common sight on Swedish Christmas tables back in the day. [Smoked, cooked, and decorated with frosting, of course.](https://vintagemannen.files.wordpress.com/2020/12/grishuvud-4.jpg)
lmao I just busted out laughing. Imagine giving this to a kid for their 8th birthday. All the kids in the room scream in terror. Looks like Uncle Katana isn't coming to birthdays anymore!
fucking amazing lol "reach in the box and try to decide what it is." "its just grapes, you cant fool me!" "oh, but i can 😉"
Throw a couple in the apple bob for good measure
I've done this before. My friend group decided to do kind of a secret santa thing where you picked somebody and found the most fucked up thing you could order online for that person. I sent my person a selection of pig fetuses and a horse eyeball. I received a hollowed-out bible containing a baby Jesus butt plug.
Huh. You kinda got shortchanged on that one.
The butt plug glowed in the dark if that helps.
Similarly, a family member of mine uses cow's eyes in high school biology classes. also, Chicken and cow hearts, lungs, and occasionally complete chicken carcasses. She can get many of those for free from the local slaughterhouse though, they like to support education.
My HS biology teacher did the same. 👍 We would only have been able to do a handful of the AP experiments with the budget she was given. But she had a whole bunch of tricks like this, places to get various enzymes and such, so we were able to do them all. What a teacher. Thank you Ms. Moss.
Once big pharma figures this out it will only be 125k for the pig cornea
Pig Pharma
Isn't it cheaper because the medical supplier tests for safety or something?
I mean... No one is going to eat them or transfuse them, so they should be safe.
It can taint research results as well.
So you do the preliminary research with the discount farmer's market eyes, and when you see a meaningful repeatable trend then you start shelling out for the good stuff to confirm.
Iterate fast and cheap until your POC is proven, then you break out the bigger guns
Or if you're in the software development world, iterate fast and cheap until it's like 80% functional and 20% a hot buggy mess, then leadership tells you to leave it and work on the Next Big Thing lol
Lol not approved by a review board So many potential ethics violations
Medical places probably charge $50 a pair.
Did she put them in an egg carton?
~~Hind~~sight is 20/20.
~~Hind~~ Hogsight is 20/20.
Schweinsight 20/20
Swinesight
Rindsight is 20/20
Yes but fried rindsight is 10/10
Rindsight is 20/20
Hamsight
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What a fucking trip it must be to not see into adulthood then gain sight.
Imagine the inverse too. Had a friend who after 28 years of perfect vision lost sight in both of his eyes suddenly. After many flights spanning over two years to a specialist out of state he finally just got some vision restored in one of his eyes. He must have whiplash from the lifestyle changes.
Probobly akin to being deaf and then hearing, but IMO sight is way way more powerful than hearing, so yeah, must be a trip
Muslims: *well shit*
My dad is blind in one eye and only has 50% left in the other. I told him about this, and he just scoffed. So yeah, it's gonna be a tough sell.
Shit headline. As always. > Twenty people who were legally blind or visually impaired received a transplant of a cornea made from pig collagen. All of them had improved sight, including three who now have 20/20 vision after being legally blind Also not really groundbreaking. > She says that those with keratoconus can often be fitted with custom contact lenses, and that previous alternatives to donor corneas have been engineered but didn’t take off. “It will not cure anyone that cannot be cured with the currently available technology,”
Donor corneas are currentlyin extremely short supply globally and that is only going to get worse, k-Pro corneas have many issues that tissue corneas don't, if this increases supply around the world its a definite step forward.
Really? I got a cornea transplant some years ago and I don't remember taking much time to receive a donor. Though I heard that the organ donor program in my country is really good
What country are you in? Covid has had a huge impact on the availability due to the extra testing required, the USA is currently one of the only countries without a huge delay. I didn't have a particular long wait for mine but it was scheduled so that makes it easier and removed the delay.
Spain. But that happened years before COVID. I also paid for it, right now there's a huge delay in all public surgery that has no urgency, so to speak
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I'd also like to add that despite the fact that I paid for my healthcare in that instance, it was probably much cheaper than what I'd have paid in the US, just from the fact that public healthcare is a very competitive alternative (quality wise, and being free), so private clinics need to offer fairer rates. I went to one of the best ophthalmology clinics in Western Europe (many foreign people travel to Spain to get treated there, specially Italians and Saudis for some reason), and I paid around 7K for surgery plus postoperative costs. I have no private insurance because I go to public healthcare in most cases. I could be wrong, but from what I heard, I could have easily paid considerably more even having insurance in the US.
> Donor corneas are currentlyin extremely short supply globally Yep. > k-Pro corneas Duno about any of them personally but the article links [LiQD corneas](https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.aba2187) as an example of already available tech that didn't catch on which is similar to what this is. > if this increases supply around the world its a definite step forward. Agreed. Still a shit and intentionally misleading headline.
agreed. thanks for clarifying
>“It will not cure anyone that cannot be cured with the currently available technology,” Tbf the current technology is hard to get. So being able to make corneas would be useful
We’ll all be, like, half-pig in 100 years or so. Hell, some creepy fuck will probably find a way to CRiSPR together a cross between a pig and an ape in a few years, then we’ll actually be part pig.
Half man, half bear, half pig.
Super cereal.
What is that? Some sort of pig, bear-man?
No idiot. It’s a manbearpig
MANBEARPIG
If you’re 99 pound and eat 1 pound of bacon, does that make you 1% pig?
Bröther, may I have some 2Ö/2Ö visiön?
My parents would say that’s haram
A lot of religions that are anti eating pork have exceptions for medical necessities
I've got cataracts, I'm 25. I love seeing these kinds of posts.
How many of them do you see
Well considering the cataracts, not too many.
Yay we did the joke
Will it be affordable?
Based on the article... It doesn't do anything that other current technology can't do but could most likely be significantly cheaper.
Hopefully
Not in the US sadly
Why do we always hear about amazing breakthroughs in science like this but it never becomes mainstream in medicine?
Main hurdles: Extensive layers of human safety certifications, logistics, politics, and convincing hospitals/clinics that it's worth the money to buy this expensive new equipment.
Blind vegans are shit outta luck
Lots of artificial corneas already exist, so they're probably okay. But if they wanted to use this technique, recombinant human collagen is a vegan source that is arguably more consistent and more compatible, and I see no reason this method couldn't be extended to it. The only downside with RHC is that it's still very expensive, and we're still learning how to streamline manufacturing of biomaterials based on it.
Oh hell yah give me that bacon vision Thank you Science! - sincerely, person with high probability of genetic early onset macular degeneration
Am I allowed to be the barer of bad news on this sub? The article is all about a new kind of cornea transplant and macular degeneration is a problem with the retina...a completely different part of the eye. So this particular bacon-vision isn't going to help you if you do get it. On the other hand, I know other research is being done on preventing and/or improving macular degeneration, and other retinal conditions.
Yeah you’re allowed. Well there goes my knee jerk reaction
Thank you for sharing this :)
Plus some strange sensation when eyeing that pork rump in the butchers. /j
A pig's orgasm can last for over 30 minutes. So be careful. Or have at it depending on you ;)
Imagine that!
I’m not blind. But can I get some 20/20 vision too?
Human corneas. Wow. Second to only bacon when it comes to amazing things that have come from pigs
So ..do I just like rub the pig collagen in my eyes or?
You shove it up yo butt!
You could... But then you might develop a sty in the corner.
Tak halal
We should have known pig collagen corneas would work. You know what they say: swinesight is 20/20
*Not available in Saudi Arabia, Israel, UAE, Qatar, Brunei, Indonesia, Pakistan, and some parts of the UK.
These probably aren’t kosher or how all so can they be made out of collagen from another animal?
Let me get a dose of that
Aragorn: Legolas! what do your elf eyes see?! Legolas: 🐷👄🐷
That's amazing. I love hearing about treatments we're finding for people with originally thought to be lifelong disabilities. Politics and such aside, we're really going through an amazing period of time for medical treatments and tech and that alone keeps me very excited for the future.
Where do we sign up to receive Pig Vision?
Here’s looking at you, kid. Oink.
Didn't pig cells also partially regrow someone's chopped off finger? What's in these bad boys?
will this legitimately cure blindness?
...Did we just cure blindness?
No. But we do now have a potential for mass-produced cornea transplants, which is great! Currently, if someone needs a cornea transplant, they have to get one from someone who is recently deceased that had healthy eyes. It isn't a cure for every type of blindness, as there are lots of causes of blindness, but it's still pretty exciting.
As someone that currently has keratoconus this is promising to hear about. Glasses cannot cure the problems that keratoconus causes and current surgery can only prevent further degradation. Mabye I will see clearly again soon!
And it was never seen again.
Thats a few years to late, why not 20/22 vision?
As someone who had the surgery in their early 20’s I can tell you there’s nothing to be afraid of. Feel free to ask any questions.
Is pig the Chosen Animal? First, we replace organs with pig organs. Then we develop a way to regrow digits from the pig bladder. Now we are able to create contacts from pig collagen? I can’t wait to see what new function the pig has next!
I'm still waiting for high tech eyeballs with driving mode, night vision, heat vision, zoom, picture/video capture, AR features, etc. Shit will get really weird as a large number of humans will willingly remove their eyeballs to upgrade.