Professor’s joy as research aids sight of stroke victims

Science: Academic hails ‘huge leap forward’ in restoring patients’ vision

An Aberdeen University academic says seeing his research being used to help restore stroke victims’ sight is a dream come true.

School of Psychology head, Professor Arash Sahraie, was part of an international team seeking ways to aid patients’ recovery.

The result – a technique for retraining eyes to move better and compensate for the loss of vision – has just been published.

And thanks to a former graduate of the university, the research has also been turned into a piece of software that is already having an impact.

Arrash Nekonam is managing director of the Granite City-based Insiso software development which built the product for US firm NovaVision.

It is bought and downloaded by patients who do a series of exercises spotting hidden objects to rebuild their capacity to see a full picture.

Already in use in the US, Prof Sahraie hopes that growing awareness of the technique will see it picked up by more doctors in the UK. “It is a huge leap forward,” he said, as the joint study with Munich and Verona universities was published.

“It’s the leap of transferring science into everyday use by patients”

“We are delighted. It’s the leap of transferring science into everyday use by patients. It’s the kind of thing every scientist would dream of.”

Around a third of stroke survivors lose some sight due to a loss of communication between eye and brain.

Some can be restored by clinical techniques but Prof Sahraie found the brain could also be re-trained to make better use of unaffected sight.

“This type of sight deficit can be massively debilitating,” he said. “Patients report a loss of confidence in ability to navigate. That can manifest itself in withdrawal from daily life.”

CLEARER VIEW: Professor Arash Sahraie is optimistic that new techniques to aid eyesight can be widely used