Bilberry Protects the Retinal Structures Against Retinal Diseases

By Kyle J. Norton


The retina is a thin membranous lining at the back of the eye located near the optic nerve that allows us to see by sensing light and sending signals to the brain.

People with the retinal disease may experience symptoms of seeing floating specks or cobwebs,  blurred or distorted (straight lines look wavy) vision depending on the location of retinal damage.

In serious cases,  the retinal disease may cause complete loss of the vision.

Treatment of retinal disease completely depends on the condition. Most cases of the treatment goals are to stop or slow the disease. Untreated retinal diseases have been found to induce severe vision loss or blindness.

The exact causes of retinal disease are not identified. However, high blood cholesterol, glucose, and hypertension, smoking, exposure to sunlight are some major risk factors associated with the onset of retinal diseases.

Some researchers suggested that genetic preposition may have a strong implication in the facilitation of retinal diseases.

Dr. Peter J Francis, in the study of the genetics of inherited retinal disease, wrote, "Over the subsequent 150 years, a huge number of articles have been dedicated to the description of the various patterns of hereditary retinal diseases, also known as retinal dystrophies".

And, "One of the genes, RPE65, has become of particular significance following the finding of a spontaneously occurring mutation in the equivalent gene in the Briard dog. Trials of gene replacement therapy have proved successful in restoring sight to such affected dogs and in the next couple of years the first human trials of gene therapy by replacing human photoreceptor RPE65are timetabled".

Bilberry is a species of low-growing shrubs in the genus Vaccinium, belonging to the family Ericaceae, native to Northern Europe.

The plant has been used as herbs in traditional medicine for the treatment of acute and chronic diarrhea, gastritis, gastric ulcer, and duodenal ulcer, enterocolitis, ulcerative colitis, anemia, cystitis, kidney disease, and psoriasis, diabetes, etc.

Scientists with an aim to find a natural and active compound for the treatment of retinal diseases examined the complex lutein formula (CLF) by combining several natural compounds: Calendula officinalis, Lycium barbarum, Vaccinium myrtillus, Cassia obtusifolia, and Rhodiola Rosea retinal functions in an animal model.

Without treatment of complex lutein formula (CLF), animals exposed to light for 7 days decreased significantly retinal function.

 However,  animals received the CLF exhibited superior performance of a retinal function, despite light exposure.

Injection of CLF animals also preserved a greater portion of the outer nuclear layer (ONL) (i.e. the nuclei of photoreceptors) compared with the animals that had not received the formula after 7 days of light exposure.

Dr. Cheng YP, the lead scientist wrote, " These results revealed that our dietary CLF supplement attenuated retinal function loss resulting from long-term light exposure".

In order to expose more information about bilberry anti retinal diseases, researchers investigated the neuroprotective effects of bilberry extract against photo-stress in murine retinas.

Light-induced visual function impairment through a stomach tube in Balb/c mice (750 mg/kg body weight) visual function impairment was restored by the injection of bilberry extract.

The retinal protective activity of bilberry extract was associated with the suppression of photo-induced apoptosis in the photoreceptor cell layer and shortening of the outer segments of rod and cone photoreceptors.

Bilberry extract treatment also inhibited the production of reactive oxygen species that reversed transcriptase polymerase chain reaction and the endoplasmic reticulum (ER) stress markers by enhancing the levels of antioxidant.

Dr. Osada H and colleagues said, " bilberry extract attenuates photo-induced apoptosis and visual dysfunction most likely, and at least in part, through ROS reduction, and subsequent ER stress attenuation in the retina".

Taken altogether, bilberry may be considered a functional remedy for the prevention and treatment of retinal diseases with no side effects, pending to the validation of larger sample size and multicenter human study.

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Author Biography
Kyle J. Norton (Scholar, Master of Nutrition, All right reserved)
Health article writer and researcher; Over 10.000 articles and research papers have been written and published online, including worldwide health, ezine articles, article base, health blogs, self-growth, best before it's news, the karate GB daily, etc.,.
Named TOP 50 MEDICAL ESSAYS FOR ARTISTS & AUTHORS TO READ by Disilgold.com Named 50 of the best health Tweeters Canada - Huffington Post
Nominated for shorty award over last 4 years
Some articles have been used as references in medical research, such as international journal Pharma and Bioscience, ISSN 0975-6299.

References
(1) Effect of a complex lutein formula in an animal model for light-induced retinaldegeneration by Cheng YP1, Ke CY2, Kuo CC1, Lee YJ2. (PubMed)
(2) Neuroprotective effect of bilberry extract in a murine model of photo-stressed retina by Osada H1, Okamoto T1,2, Kawashima H1,2, Toda E1, Miyake S1,3, Nagai N1,2, Kobayashi S3, Tsubota K2, Ozawa Y. (PubMed)
(3) Genetics of inherited retinal disease by Peter J Francis. (PMC)