Science Adviser looks at medical advice given by an optometrist on a contact lens:
When your optometrist asks you to look through a machine at the red hot air balloon in the distance and warns you about an incoming “little puff of air,” they’re measuring your eye pressure. If that pressure is too high, you may be at risk for glaucoma, a disease that can damage the optic nerve and lead to vision loss.
But intraocular pressure (IOP) is difficult to monitor outside the clinic, leaving long gaps between measurements and complicating treatment. To address this, researchers developed a soft contact lens, described in a study published in Science Translational Medicine, that can continuously track intraocular pressure and release drugs when needed.
“We believe less is more,” senior author and biomedical engineer Yangzhi Zhu told STAT News….
Because the system is battery-free and built from biocompatible materials, it more closely resembles conventional contact lenses, making it potentially safer and more comfortable to wear long-term. The authors suggest that this approach could form the basis of “pharmacy-on-a-contact-lens” platforms that both sense and treat disease.
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You can read more here, in STAT News.