Don't Let AMD Diagnosis Be a Shot in the Dark
Donna Shotwell, OD
AMD is three times more prevalent than glaucoma and Dr. Shotwell is seeing this firsthand in her own eye care practice. Luckily, early diagnosis means she can take action to preserve her patients’ vision and improve outcomes.
Transcript:
AdaptDx will change the way you take care of patients with macular degeneration
I added the AdaptDx to my practice once I found out how many patients I had missed with very early AMD. Not being able to recognize the disease until I actually saw them on parental photos or imaging kind of scared me that I would be losing at least three years of treatment for the health of the patient. I think the purchase of the AdaptDx will change the way you take care of patients with macular degeneration it’s been literally eye-opening for me. I see three to four times more patients with macular degeneration that have glaucoma.
Eye care professionals and patients can get peace of mind with the AdaptDx test
Financially, it’s one of the best reimbursements for my practice. It can run it with any other test the same time and just having the patient’s know 90 percent accuracy, whether they do or they don’t have the disease, is life-changing for them. In the past, I’ve had patients have very early AMD and I wouldn’t really know how often I should see them. You know, it’s almost like a shot in the dark. You know, I’ve got early stages but maybe I think we’ll let you go for six months or maybe nine months but now with the AdaptDx, depending on what their right intercept number is, I can definitely say, “No, you need to be back in three months.”
Once you integrate AdaptDx technology, you’ll wonder how you did without it
I cannot imagine practicing without the AdaptDx. It was the same thing when the OCT came on the market years ago. What I do like about the AdaptDx is when I was learning about the OCT, there was a learning curve, you know, with with the different layers and what this meant and what this disease looked like. With the AdaptDx, it’s one number. It’s a timed test and it makes it much more easy for us to diagnose obviously, and therefore, treat and offer treatment options for the pieces. I think that it would be a disservice to the patients to not offer something that can give them an advance notice that they have macular degeneration up to three years before we can actually image it.