Missile Guidance Technology Improves Your Vision

“It's the same technology that is used in the missile guidance systems in Iraq by the US armed forces,” said Lynne Young, Manager of Operations for Johns Hopkins’ Wilmer Eye Institute. Young said this wavefront Iris Registration technology is one of the tools used by surgeons at Hopkins to improve a patient’s vision.

The Wilmer Eye Institute has built its reputation on cutting-edge technology and the skills of its surgeons and nursing staff. Patients come from 49 states and 73 countries to be treated for cataracts, glaucoma, and "chronic corneal diseases.” Designated a Maryland Trauma Center, the Institute is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, to treat eye injures from blunt or sharp objects and chemicals.

Being first, with the latest technology and treatments, is in keeping with the legacy of Dr. William Holland Wilmer who performed the “first clear lens extraction” and wrote “the first publications on the effects of flights on vision.” In the museum at the institute, the public can see early surgical instruments and the “president’s chair” where eight presidents of the United States sat for their examinations.

The Wilmer Eye Institute was started after a grateful patient, Aida de Costa Root Breckenridge, raised $3 million dollars by combining gifts from Dr. Wilmer’s patients with a $1.4 million grant from the Rockefeller Foundation in 1922.

The advanced work at the Institute is still funded by a combination of corporate and patient gifts. Boone Pickens, chairman of BP Capital Management, donated $2.3 million in 2005. The youngest philanthropist, Sarah Hill, 10, who was treated at Wilmer for juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, raised $30,000 with a letter-writing campaign.

Peter J. McDonnell, M.D., William Holland Wilmer Professor, said that the 81-year-old Wilmer Institute is not slowing down. “The halls are fused with energy and positive change and a firm belief we can help improve the vision of and lives of millions of people around the world.”

(Photo: A technician examines the eye of a patient after cataract surgery. Photo by L. Sponsler)