Computer-Assisted Laser Treatment Using Real-Time Retinal Tracking

Diabetic retinopathy resulting from long-term diabetes mellitus is one of the common diseases that leads to choroidal neovascularization (CNV), a leading cause of blindness. Among the currently available treatment methods, a laser can be used to photocoagulate the diseased areas. Several thousand laser shots are usually required during such treatment. Special care must be taken to avoid hitting the blood vessel tree, the macula, the optic disk, and the region among them. For a single eye, this procedure requires up to several hours that are usually divided over many treatment sessions. Consequently, the development of an accurate laser treatment guidance system to treat the whole retina in one session would improve the effectiveness of such procedures.