Restoring Retinal Health

Heating of the retinal tissue and retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) causes a range of beneficial effects on unhealthy tissues, including elevated therapeutic heat shock protein production, downregulation of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), thinning of Bruch’s membrane, reduction of drusens, resolution of subretinal fluid, prevention of apoptosis, and activation of autophagy [Refs. 1-15].

These heat-activated mechanisms pursue to reduce oxidative stress, prevent the aggregation of proteins, improve the transport of nutrients, and enhance RPEs cytoprotective mechanisms, i.e., they stimulate the natural, biological healing response of the RPE [Refs. 16, 17]. Laser-induced heat shock activates mechanisms in the RPE that could retard or even reverse the progression of major retinal diseases.

Non-damaging laser treatments aim to induce regenerative effects of the temperature elevation without damaging retinal tissues. The beneficial effect of non-damaging laser treatments has been demonstrated in several clinical trials for common macular diseases such as diabetic macular edema (DME), retinal vein occlusion (RVO), chronic central serous chorioretinopathy (cCSC) and age-related macular degeneration (AMD) [Refs. 1, 2, 18-30]. However, the therapeutic temperature range of the treatment is narrow, and the laser-induced temperature elevation varies between patients due to physiological differences in eye opacity, blood circulation, and the level of pigmentation. Maculaser offers patient-specific temperature and safety controls to conduct personally optimized laser treatments.