Myopia, migraine etc

Kaisu Viikari's theory:

1) Humans are originally "hyper(metr)opics" (= farsighted, evolved to watch into distance)

Why? Ability to see far is very important for survival. Darkness also worsens vision so humans evolved to be very farsighted so that they could see accurately even in the darkness. Let me quote Daniel Everett's "Don't Sleep, There Are Snakes"

"...We were walking after dark from his hut to my house, about five hundred yards on a narrow jungle path that passed a shallow swamp. I was talking loudly to Kaioá and guiding myself on the path with my flashlight. Kaioá was slightly behind me, with no flashlight. Suddenly he interrupted the flow of my verbiage and said softly, "Look at the caiman up ahead!"

I directed the beam of my flashlight up the path. I did not see a thing. "Turn off that lightninglike thing in your hand," Kaioá suggested, "and look in the dark."

I followed his instructions. Now I really saw absolutely nothing. "What are you talking about?" I asked, beginning to feel that he was having me on. "There's nothing up ahead."
"No! Look!" Kaioá giggled. My inability to see beyond my nose is a source of constant merriment among the Pirahãs. "See those two bloodlike eyes up there?"

I strained my own eyes and then, sure enough, I would just make out two red dots about a hundred feet up ahead. Kaioá said that these were the eyes of a small caiman. He picked up a heavy stick from the dark jungle floor and ran ahead of me. After a couple of seconds I could hear the stick pounding something but I couldn't see anything. Shortly thereafter, Kaioá came back toward me laughing and carrying by the tail a three-foot caiman, beaten unconscious but not yet dead."

* I dunno whether Viikari mentions evolution, but I think she does. She often mentions Creator in her writings.

2) Nowadays we are doing very much close work and that causes problems because we aren't naturally "designed" for close work / reading. 

We read, sit at the computer, stay indoors etc... That all causes a unprecedented strain on our ciliary muscle. And slowly that leads to an accomodation cramp, a spasm of ciliary muscle. Most common symptoms are myopia (that she calls pseudomyopia because there is often still latent farsightedness that might be possible to recover if one just does something to the spasm) and migraine but Viikari also notes that accomodation spasm might contribute even to back pain or high blood pressure.

Let me cite Kaisu's newest book:

"In the beginning of time, rather than doing a lot of near work, humans were mainly designed for looking at a distance, for hunting and similar activities. But as we all know, the modern human does a lot of near work that requires great precision, to a great extent continuously and without a break. This forces the eye to perform muscular work for hours, and a muscle that is forced to contract a lot is easily driven to a state of spasm, a cramp, quite similarly to such as a writer's cramp in the fingers or a cramp suffered by a marathon runner in the calf muscle. This cramp, however, is not released on its own. In an accommodation cramp, the eye has got stuck on a target that is close, and seeing at a distance begins to suffer. When a person lifts his eyes for example to look at the blackboard, he cannot see clearly."

"As a result of long-term and demanding close work, a person may develop Asp. [Asp = accomodation spasm] Rays of light from a close distance only are refracted on the retina (Figure 1). Because of Asp, the lens cannot relax and reach a state of rest, and for this reason, rays of light coming from a distance are refracted in front of the retina and the eye is in a state of pseudomyopia. As an external and pathognomonic sign of Asp, even a young person will develop 1 or 2 upright furrows in the forehead over the years. Asp is powerful enough to increase to 10-12 dioptres and over, enduring until the patient reaches his or her 50's or even longer. Even a lay person understands the state of tension to which unrelenting stress of this degree exposes the system, possibly culminating in epileptic convulsions."


[boldings and the link by Valtsu]

3) Those who achieve the state of (pseudo)myopia, get minus glasses...

...which makes the spasm worse and often lead to even worse myopia and other symptoms. Viikari thinks that people with slight myopia symptoms should quickly start using plus glasses for reading and etc work because they prevent the spasm from happening and might even lead to complete resolution of myopia. However, the recovery from accomodation spasm is very slow and difficult and that's not an overnight cure.

An interesting testimonial

I think you might find this testimonial interesting. This guy got myopia which was obviously caused by near work. Oculists made the situation worse by giving him minus glasses. And as a result he got very serious problems. And finally he started using plus glasses which made his life much better.

"My experience with some oculists was unfortunate. One oculist even recommended to go to a psychiatrist, although I was convinced that, to a considerable extent, my suffering was caused by my vision problems."

Ouch!

Kaisu Viikari's book Panacea (1978)

Panacea is her magnum opus. It contains a HUGE amount of detailed patient data (statistics) and case reports. I haven't read it yet but I have read her similar book Tetralogia which is in Finnish language and contains much fewer pages.

Anyone can download Panacea from Kaisu Viikari's site. It's a PDF-file. Actually, all her books are freely distributed on her site. She was kind enough to mail me her the paper version and didn't request money for that!


"I have the impression that among my colleagues I was known as the lowest paid ophthalmologist in the country – partly because of the time-consuming I used to give my patients the best treatment.


In this connection, I will tell you a true story:
Once in the middle of the night, at 00.30 a.m., I was returning from a session
with my translator, when I was for the first and only time fined for speeding. I
was taken to the police station for an interview, and the police office, after
hearing what my income was, said: "I do feel sorry for you!"" - Kaisu Viikari

And what about migraine?

Her book Tetralogia (1972) had nice statistics that of her migraine patients

- 48 had been cured

- 32 had good results

- 86 had no success so far (however, Viikari says it this way "unfinished", many of those were probably new patients)

- 8 refused the treatment

In Panacea (1978) there is much more text but I haven't read that... However, there is some data of 100 consecutive migraine patients

- 56 symptom-free

- 14 much better

- 8 better

- 8 treatment interrupted / did not follow instructions

- 14 no answer

Why some people don't get myopia even if they read a lot?

The baseline degree of hyperopia varies. Some people are only slightly hyperopic at the beginning so they easily get (pseudo)myopia from accomodation spasm. Some people might be VERY hyperopic from the beginning so they have to get a extreme cramp in order to have myopia symptoms. But they get migraine instead!


Kaisu has also noticed that the earlier one begins reading, the higher are chances that they get related problems. Children who start reading in the very young age, have very high risk of getting myopia and other problems caused by accomodation spasm.

Conclusion

It seems that at least some people would have better life if they ignored the advice of their oculists/opticians! :O 

Lucian's testimonial is one of the extreme cases (few people lose their ability to work because of their eyes) but there is enough patient data in Panacea to prove that Lucian's absolutely not the only one!




EDIT: Here's Bobby Matherne's review of Viikari's book: http://www.doyletics.com/arj/nomyopia.htm