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Colin has lost his vision, but as a family, we’ve lost a man who was so independent, able to turn his hand to anything.

Pam (Colin’s wife and full-time carer)

Colin was a second-generation farmer who loved his life. But sight loss took it all away from him. Colin was diagnosed with age-related macular degeneration, or AMD, over 20 years ago.

Now, he can’t even look out over the farmland that had been in his family for generations, the land he was forced to sell when he lost his sight.

It’s painful for Colin’s three daughters as well. When they drive past the old family farm, they can’t bring themselves to look. The loss is too great.

Meet Colin

Colin’s daughter Kerry explained:

It’s been really hard watching Dad lose his ability to do things on the farm and go fishing. It’s really been a struggle watching him just lose everything that he used to do all the time.

And one day, Kerry and her sisters may not be able to see the farm they grew up on either, because they also have been diagnosed with early-stage AMD.

There’s currently no way to stop it. No way to reverse the slow decline and inevitable loss of sight.

You might not have heard of age-related macular degeneration, or AMD, but it’s the most common macular disease and leading cause of vision loss and blindness in Australia.

As a disease with a genetic component, generation after generation is affected. That means that AMD is hereditary, and the children of someone diagnosed with AMD have a 50% risk of diagnosis.

AMD causes progressive loss of central vision, leaving the peripheral vision intact. This affects a person’s ability to read, watch TV, and recognise faces.

Colin has the dry form of the condition, also known as Geographic Atrophy. While it’s possible to treat the wet form of AMD, known as neovascular AMD, there is no treatment for Geographic Atrophy and no cure for either type.

Losing his sight meant that Colin could no longer see well enough to work on his beloved farm. Geographic Atrophy has taken away so much – his wife Pam has become his full-time carer and they’ve had to give up all the plans for retirement.

‘I don’t think people actually value sight until they suddenly find they haven’t got it,” Colin said. ‘If you have a heart attack you go to hospital, you’re looked after, but with Geographic Atrophy, you could go to hospital but it’s not much bloody good because they can’t do anything for you. Then this gets worse and it makes life quite unbearable at times.

All the things I thought we’d be doing when we weren’t farming, where we’d be travelling – they just haven’t happened. I feel like I’ve let the family down and let them down big time, but I had no control over it.”

With the help of the wonderful people like you, Macular Disease Foundation Australia is determined to give hope to families like Colin’s by funding research that could stop AMD in it’s tracks.

Macular Disease Foundation Australia is committed to finding new and better treatments, and ultimately, cures for macular disease.

We provide the largest funding pool for macular disease research outside of the Australian government funded National Health and Medical Research Council. And we also undertake our own research to expand the evidence base on macular disease and it’s management.

Donations from wonderful people like you have already supported 34 research projects, each contributing to the knowledge bank for macular disease.

One exciting example is the work of Professor Alice Pebay from the University of Melbourne.

Professor Pebay’s promising research project focuses on a new stem cell model for dry AMD, the form of macular disease that Colin lives with.

After a year-long collaboration between some of Australia’s leading experts in stem cell biology, ophthalmology and computational biology, Professor Pebay has produced a genetic roadmap for AMD that could be a game changer for the discovery of novel treatments.

This exciting development would not have been possible without the generous support of our macular disease community. And it leads to new treatments for AMD, this would be such wonderful news for Colin and Pam’s daughters, and their grandchildren too.

Please donate today to help advance this important research and stop the loss for people like Colin. We thank you in advance for your wonderful support.

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Thank you for your generous support. And remember, if you or a loved one ever need information, advice or just a friendly chat, please call our National Helpline on 1800 111 709.