A part of your retina called the macula deteriorates with macular degeneration.
This means you might clearly see at 20 feet what someone with perfect vision could see at 200 feet.
How Is AMD Different Than Other Age-Related Vision Changes?
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However, it’s uncommon for macular degeneration to develop without symptoms in the early stages.
Some forms of macular degeneration can appear at an earlier age.
Juvenile macular degeneration, or Stargardt disease, usually occurs between ages 6 and 12.
Only 1 in 10,000 children are affected, but getting an accurate diagnosis can take up to age 20.
The impact on vision and disease progression differentiates dry AMD from wet AMD.
Dry AMDis the most common jot down.
It makes up about 90% of all age-related macular degeneration cases.
Dry AMD doesn’t always progress past this early stage to a level of noticeable vision loss.
Nearly everyone over 50 has at least one of these drusen.
Wet AMDoften develops as a progression of dry age-related macular degeneration.
The evolution from dry to wet macular degeneration happens when new blood vessels grow underneath the retina.
It also can make existing macular degeneration progress faster.
Various studies have ranked smoking as one of the most significant avoidable risk factors for AMD.
Theamount you smokeand when you quit can play a role, too.
There are several stages of dry AMD, and geographic atrophy is the advanced form of the disease.
With it, physical and structural changes to the retina occur.
Rapid vision changes and loss are common in late-stage AMD and geographic atrophy.
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