Progress in Therapeutic Lasers to Treat Eye Diseases

Article: U of A spinoff company's innovative technology could treat retinal diseases that affect millions worldwide
Source: University of Alberta (Canada)
Published: May 18, 2021

As a spinoff of PhD work in electrical biomedical engineering, a start-up company is developing new imaging technology that more precisely guides laser treatment of retinal diseases. The founder of the start-up PulseMedica was interested in ophthalmic imaging applications to treat age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a leading cause of visual decline in people over 60 years of age. In particular, he was most interested in dry AMD; though less sight-threatening than wet AMD, dry AMD accounts for the vast majority of AMD cases. Furthermore, most patients with wet AMD progress to that stage from dry AMD, thus a treatment strategy that slows or halts progression from earlier stages could be helpful. Current treatments for dry AMD include (and are limited to) eye vitamins following the AREDS2 formula. Where laser treatments are used for wet AMD, the researcher argues that current technology is imprecise, resulting in collateral damage to the retina. He instead wanted to bring the technology being developed in engineering labs to create faster, more precise lasers to treat earlier stages of AMD. He comments, “We were doing really cool things in the lab, but I started to think, ‘How do we take this into the real world, how do we use it so we can actually help people?’” PulseMedica's innovations include a 3-D retinal scanning head that uses machine-learning algorithms to map the regions of the eye associated with retinal disease; that imaging would then be used to guide therapeutic lasers. The next stage of their project is to add new-generation femtosecond lasers to the scanning head, after which they would proceed to studies in animals. Although the company founder's main interest is in dry AMD, advancements in photodisruptive lasers could subsequently be used to treat other eye diseases, such as glaucoma and diabetic retinopathy, that affect additional hundreds of millions of people. The entrepreneur concludes with a motivation for his project in connection with his university. He states, “I know so many people who graduated from the U of A who were absolutely amazing individuals, really talented people, and where did they end up going? They ended up leaving Alberta, and that is sad...I decided that I need to be part of the ecosystem that starts businesses and keeps those talented people in Alberta.”

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