ROP (Retinopathy of prematurity) is one of the main causes of vision loss in children and no technological advancement has helped, until now. Engineers at Duke University have introduced a handheld device to find and monitor ROP diagnosis and treatment, which is a cause for blindness in premature babies.

With this device, the scientists have managed to create a 3-D image of the back of the eye which could help find serious medical conditions in an infant’s eyes. The device creates a high resolution 3-D map of the eyeball layers, similar to looking into the side of a fish tank and seeing everything in detail. This new device can take pictures up to 40x faster than an average opthalmoscope which is rather slow at identifying eye conditions. This can help identify eye conditions faster and could end up saving many lives. The device is currently being tested by Duke Eye Center ophthalmologist, Cynthia Toth to decide what it can do when it comes to treatment decisions regarding eye conditions. Amazing stuff!

(Via GizmoWatch)