May 6, 2025 - EyeClarity Podcast
Set up a free discovery call with Dr. Berne to learn more about his practitioenr’s training: appointments@drsamberne.com
Practitioner’s Program Link: https://www.drsamberne.com/practition…
For even more from Dr. Sam, check out his new exclusive membership where you get access to my content and resources, new information, articles, videos, webinars: https://drsambernesmembership.com/
Keywords
macular pucker, holistic eye health, peripheral vision, vision therapy, liver health, eye nutrition, nearsightedness, eye exercises, vision programming, eye care
Summary
In this podcast, Sam Berne discusses macular pucker, a condition affecting vision, and explores holistic approaches to eye health. He emphasizes the importance of understanding the root causes of vision problems, the role of peripheral vision, and the influence of genetics on eye health. Additionally, he highlights the significance of liver health and nutrition in maintaining optimal vision, providing practical advice and exercises for listeners.
Takeaways
• Macular pucker is a condition where scar-like tissue forms on the macula.
• Holistic approaches focus on root causes rather than just symptoms.
• Nutritional support is vital for retinal health.
• Peripheral vision exercises can alleviate stress on the macula.
• Genetic predispositions can influence vision problems.
• Lasik surgery may not address underlying vision programming.
• Binasal occlusion can help shift focus away from the macula.
• Liver health is crucial for eye function and nutrient absorption.
• Regular detoxification can support overall eye health.
• Maintaining a balanced diet and hydration is essential for vision.
Sound Bites
• “We want to get to the root cause.”
• “It’s a very high concentration of cones.”
• “Reducing inflammation is key.”
• “Methylene blue helps mitochondria function.”
• “Nearsightedness starts in the mind.”
• “Support your pancreas and thyroid health.”
Chapters
00:00Understanding Macular Pucker
07:20Holistic Approaches to Eye Health
14:39The Role of Peripheral Vision
20:52Genetic Influences on Vision
27:08Liver Health and Eye Function
Transcript:
Sam Berne (00:01.326)
Hey everyone. wanted to invite you to this podcast today where I gave somebody a session who was diagnosed with a condition called macular pucker. So I’ve done a lot of video blogs on this subject and this particular person was diagnosed with macular pucker in the right eye. And here are some of the things that I recommended for her. So if you know somebody who’s got a macular pucker
This may be worth watching listening again, anything you can do to improve your macular health is really important, especially if you work on screens. So I hope you enjoy the show. Thanks for tuning in. Wow. And my perspective on vision is more whole body. Love me. Just say that holistic. And so whenever I see an eye problem,
I try to look at the root cause or root causes and so some of the things I’m going to be saying to you are going to be a little different in the sense that we’re not here to necessarily treat symptoms. We want to get to the root cause, you know, what has caused this macular shift and it just seems like it’s it’s in the right eye, not the left eye. At least that’s what
Your report says so to define a macular pucker. Sometimes it’s called an epiretinal membrane problem or a cellophane maculopathy. So this is a condition where a thin layer like a scar like tissue forms on the macula and the macula is the center part of the retina, which is responsible for your detailed sharp eyesight.
And the fovea is a little bit bigger and then the macula sits in that. It’s a very high concentration of cones. It’s also where we get our color vision, but it makes up less than 1 % of the real estate of our retina. But it’s very important because it helps us with identification and details. So when you have a macular pucker,
Sam Berne (02:26.918)
Usually the vitreous can be involved and there’s something called a posterior vitreous detachment. The gel sac sits in front of the retina and one of the reasons why the relationship between the vitreous and the and the retina changes is because the vitreous dries out it shrinks and it starts to microscopically damage the macula or it leaves
some of the cells that grow into the membrane. It contracts and this causes this wrinkle or pucker and it causes distorted again, acuity and blurriness. Now, it’s a little different than macular degeneration. Whenever I see a macular problem, I’m looking at the OCT scan which you had done and that
kind of gives a determination on the the health of the macula. But what are the what the symptoms really show would be the straight lines become kind of curved. There can be a gray or cloudy area in the central seeing sometimes you have to move your eyes around to be able to see the print and so the conventional treatment. That’s why I asked you about vitrectomies because what they do is they remove the vitreous gel sack.
or they do a membrane peel to remove the pucker which can smooth out the retina. But the success rate that of that is is limited and that’s why I asked you so I’m glad that you’re not doing that now some of the holistic therapies to support the macula you’re already doing the keys would be reducing inflammation supporting retinal metabolism mitochondria function.
And then you want to start developing more peripheral vision in your seeing and we’ll talk a little more about that in a minute. And then there’s the nutritional protocols, which you’re already doing, you know, beta-carotene E zinc lutein zeaxanthin. I probably would add astaxanthin if you want to get a little even more esoteric saffron.
Sam Berne (04:53.996)
has been shown to help the macula curcumin resveratrol. You know, these are all neuroprotective agents that help the retina and the macula glutathione and NAC is also great for detoxification and retinal cell repair. Some people will use methylene blue, which is another mitochondria amplification where you you do meth methylene blue.
a drop or two in a glass of water and then 20 or 30 minutes later you apply your red light therapy. And so it’s a synergistic way to really target the macula and get the the mitochondria working better. Methylene blue wait 30 minutes do the red light therapy. The other thing we’re finding that’s very helpful is hydrogen water and hydrogen water helps you absorb
The water molecule better. So it’s hydrating which again one of the reasons why the vitreous changes its composition is because there’s a dehydration element and if you’ve had Lasik surgery there can be a tendency towards dryness blue light can lead towards dryness. So with the hydrogen water, you can actually get a canister that you pour the water into which makes it hydrogen water.
And it’s something that I’m just putting on your radar screen. I mean, again, it reduces inflammation. It oxygenates and hydrates and you know, if you want to go that extra yard, you could certainly do that. So those are some of the, you know, some of the basic things I would say, you know, like adding you could do a saffron. You can get saffron capsules.
Or you can cook with saffron. There have been some good studies on saffron improving macular health. Curcumin is another one. So if you cook Ayurvedic leave to your discussion around myopia and Lasik surgery, so you may have seen in some of my content or not that why do we become nearsighted? Okay, one of the reasons why we become near sighted is how we are using our eyes.
Sam Berne (07:20.555)
Which means if we gravitate towards, you know, seeing up close reading a lot learning a lot up close our muscles get tense and we have a hard time relaxing. So it creates a blur in the distance and we go to the doctor and he gives you a near-sighted lens. Now what happens over time is that you just start reinforcing the the stress response up close.
And the higher the number of your prescription, the earlier you began developing myopia. And the other thing is the higher the number could suggest some perceptual. And again, this could have just been some perceptual thing that like, wow, there’s a lot of energy coming at me. I don’t know what to do with it. Maybe it feels invasive. Maybe it doesn’t.
So we develop nearsightedness as a defense strategy and nearsightedness starts in the mind and in the brain. We want to blame the faulty vision on the eyeball, but it’s really the programming behind the eyes that creates the prescription. Now, the reason why I’m emphasizing this is that when a person becomes nearsighted, they become macula centric.
In other words, the main part of their eye that they’re relying on is their macula because the whole thing about being nearsighted is I’ve got to keep it clear. If I don’t keep it clear, I could get hurt. There’s some hyper vigilance at least deeply buried mentally. Okay. Now when you get Lasik surgery, you’re changing the prescription in the eye.
but you’re not changing the programming that created the prescription. And this is an important point because okay, the Lasik surgery is going to work for a while, but the programming is much more powerful than the Lasik surgery, which is why some people start reverting back to their myopia because the programming is just stronger.
Sam Berne (09:45.843)
And one of the main attitudes is hypervigilance. I need to keep it clear to feel safe. So you’ve got this program running in the background and whether whatever your prescription was so then you had the lasik so you have this thing over this programming now. Okay, I’m less near sighted, but the programming is still running. But what it’s doing is it’s really stressing.
the macula like gripping the world through the macula. Now, I’m being a bit dramatic here and it’s not something that you may at all be aware of but there are three things here that on a functional level. I want you to at least know about one of the best ways to start reducing the macula stress.
is really engaging more peripheral vision stimulation and we think that with contact lenses that we’re doing that but we’re actually not what contact lenses do is give us kind of a denial attitude like yeah, I got a lot more peripheral and I would say you have more peripheral in context than glasses. But here’s the rub when you go for an eye exam.
You’re sitting 20 feet away in a dark room with a machine usually behind your face or they’re doing some kind of a computerized calculation whatever they’re doing. It’s very mechanical that prescription that the doctor gives you is designed for you to use only at 20 feet. And if you start using that anything closer than 20 feet, it’s going to be too strong of a lens.
And it’s really again stressing the macula. So the distance prescription needs to be reduced in some form or fashion. If you’re in contacts, what I recommend is with your blue blockers, you can get a very small farsighted prescription put in there and it reduces the prescription. So let’s just do a little math here. Let’s say you’re
Sam Berne (12:12.613)
in context, your right eye is a minus four and we’ll say your left eye is a minus 350. The astigmatism. We’re not going to talk about it in this moment. All right. So if that prescription was actually calculated for distance, what I would recommend and I can do this for you is to get a you’re wearing your blue blocking glasses. Anyway is to get a plus 0.5 in the glasses.
which reduces the prescription and that prescription then becomes your computer prescription. Now one of the great things that that plus 50 is doing over the contacts is it’s spreading the light away from the macula and it’s softening your vision and opening up your peripheral, which is a really good thing. It also with your nervous system very subtly starts activating the parasympathetic nervous system.
That’s the part of the nervous system. That’s our relaxation response and I can tell you that with all the things that you’ve shared with me right now is that you tend to like to live or you’re familiar with living in the sympathetic nervous system state, which is our fight-flight freeze and what the glasses will do immediately is it will soften
your visual focus. It’s not going to blur it. In fact, it may even make it clearer, but you’re going to feel more relaxed. Your parasympathetic nervous system is going to be more activated and we’re moving you away from being exclusively macular centric. So any stress that’s on the macula we’re moving it away, but you’re not going to lose
visual acuity or clarity. If anything, you get more clarity, but you’re going to get relaxation and you’re going to get more rejuvenation. Now, there’s a couple of other things that sometimes I do and you and I can kind of negotiate this because some of them are a little harder to do and some of them are a little easier to do. So the second thing that sometimes what we’ll do is on the
Sam Berne (14:39.324)
the computer glasses, I’ll actually have you put a piece of scotch tape on the inside part of the lens, meaning the the medial side just maybe about a half an inch. Well, what does that do that by nasal? It’s called a binasal occlusion. It’s going to shift your fixation away from the pucker and more towards the periphery. And it’s a really great technique that we use for
anybody that kind of over focuses. So by nasal occlusion is another possibility. Another possibility is putting something in the lens besides the plus 50 which is called a yoked yoke Ed prism. Now when you hear the word prism most conventional doctors are forcing them. They put a prism over one eye to force the muscles to work which doesn’t really
help but because of my experience now on my hat the hat that I’m wearing is I am now a physical therapy optometrist. I’m speaking to you as a physical therapist eye doctor and because of that I’ve worked in the hospitals for many years for people with very unusual eye problems and the yolk prisms what they do especially for the macular pucker
is they take your peripheral vision and they give you about 30 % more. So it spreads the light out much more into your peripheral. So it’s going to give you an improvement in your spatial awareness and your light distribution in the retina. And so, you know, step one would be at the very least get the plus 50s. That’s a no brainer with the blue blockers.
If you want to get a little more confrontational and go, okay, I really want to move out of this. Then you do the binasal occlusion with the scotch tape. And then if you really wanted to, you know, go for it, then you do the yolk prisms with the plus 50 and that’s going to give you more peripheral vision. Now a couple other things with that. There is an exercise.
Sam Berne (16:59.879)
that a physical therapy exercise that would also be really good for you, which is you looking at a picture of jelly beans and the way you focus on the jelly beans is you take the picture. I would email it to you and you print it out and you hold it up to your nose and you’re mentally now looking through the picture and you’re pushing the picture out looking through it looking at the spaces between the jelly beans and all of a sudden the jelly beans pop.
And you get three-dimensional vision. So what this is doing is this is giving you more peripheral, but it’s integrating the two eyes in the brain because you’re getting depth perception. So this would be an exercise that you might do three times a day. Keep the chart by your computer. You do it 30 seconds to a minute and then you put that down and you do my palm hum exercise. So the palming humming exercise.
cupping it over your eyes and your humming on the exhale is one of the best ways to dilate the blood vessels in the eye. It creates something called nitric oxide. You’ve probably heard of it’s an ingredient that dilates the blood vessels. So humming has been shown to do that. And when you apply the hands over the eyes and you’re humming for maybe six or eight humps on the exhale
The hands are like tuning forks and you’re putting that sound into the eyes and you’re you’re getting that that nitric oxide push which is going to dilate the blood vessels and create some better relaxation and better breathing. So I will I will send you the jelly beans picture with a set of directions and I’ll send you the palm hum exercise. That would be great.
a combination to do as a physical therapy either without any lenses in or with your contacts in and then the plus 50 and so, you know, it’s like you’re you’re in a physical therapy setting using some support system, which is going to give you more peripheral and then you’re doing this active exercise which can which is going to give you even more peripheral.
Sam Berne (19:24.571)
These are really good for you to move you out of that over focalizing on the macula because we’re going to go to your ideology in a minute. Your genetic tendency is to want to over focus. That’s kind of in your genetic blueprint and it really where it shows is around your eyes and your brain.
And the way it shows up in the iris is they’re like these. I don’t know. I would call them like ditches or channels that it’s like you you’ve kind of rubbed these these these they’re called contraction furrows and they’re right. They go right through your eye and your brain area, which says you’re the kind of person where you’re growing edge is doing things like
soft open focus Chi gung be instead of do you know like you your tendency is to want to do do do until you drop that’s kind of until until there is a an obstacle put up that forces you into it, which was kind of this macular pucker situation among other things. So knowing this
Your tendency is being that so doing focus and it’s it’s your gift, but it’s too much. You’ve got to balance it out with doing some of these other softer things which may not be always comfortable for you, but it’s a life’s a lifestyle decision that will actually give you longevity better vision better health and
You know, again, it’s your growing edge. It’s a nurturing that you’re being asked to do. Okay, and we all have it. So your eye is showing a couple things. First of all, it’s showing your brown. Okay, you’ve got what’s called a brown eye. There are three main types of colors. There’s the blue eyes, there’s the hazel and there’s the brown. You are definitely proud.
Sam Berne (21:49.638)
And so when you when you’re brown, there’s a couple things that tend to run in the cycle. The first is blood stuff. So it’s not surprising to me that blood thinners like, okay, you had a blood clot. So circulation and oxygenation and hydration and lymph movement is super important for you because the brown eyed person
They’re always it’s either anemia. It’s a blood clot. It’s some blood kind of thing that’s that’s going on and then beside that around the edge of the the brown of the eye. You have something that shows the I would say the nurturing that you need to do around your liver health your liver health and your gallbladder.
Now, there’s a lot of levels and layers to this. First of all, the liver in Chinese medicine rules the eyes. The meridian is and the gallbladder and the liver work together. The second thing that’s important about the liver gallbladder is it helps you digest and absorb the eye fat soluble nutrients and here are the three main ones.
vitamin A, it’s fat soluble, lutein and zeaxanthin, those carotenoids that protect the macula. So you’ve got some liver signs here that say, hmm, it might be supportive for you to do either a liver cleanse or some liver support because there’s also the toxicity part of it as well. And of liver,
governs our cholesterol levels also and you’ve got several signals that would say hmm the liver gallbladder need to be attended to and so I can give you some ideas. There’s some really basic things with the liver that you can do number one. You just use warm water in the morning with some with lemon in it. That’s a great way to
Sam Berne (24:14.565)
If you’re going to do a salad include some bitter greens arugula Kale dandelion, know, you could look up what are bitter greens bitters are really good for the liver Castor oil is another one. That’s very good One technique is to take a couple of drops and actually rub it on your liver and then take a hot
cloth, a hot washcloth and put that over the liver and we call that a castor oil pack. And I do. I do regularly and so yeah, good. Good. So now if you want to get a little more dialed into it, there are three herbs that are really great for the liver. The first is milk thistle. The second is yellow dock.
And the third is burdock root and you can get these either separately. You can get them in a formula. There’s a company in California called Young Jevity and they make a liver gallbladder formula. And what you do is you take a dropper full and you put it say you get your hydrogen water.
Put it in a glass of hydrogen water and you sip it before you eat at that time. Take your omega-3s. Take your dietary enzymes. You’re doing it before you eat and that’s going to create your liver enzymes to work better and just do it once a day. Maybe just do a month of it. It’s a very gentle but direct cleanse of your liver gallbladder. Those three herbs.
Are really good. think burdock root also helps the blood which you could use and the yellow dock is is great for the liver. And so it’s milk this like your liver definitely needs some ongoing support and this is not a an indictment against you or something is wrong. It just this is this is what you need for your
Sam Berne (26:39.15)
You know, optimal health and wellness. I mean, you’re already doing some some great things. So I’m I’m you know, this is just more and you know, you want to move away from having to go back to these ophthalmologists and and you know, have them telling you this that or the other now, I want to go through a list.
of other things that I think based on your iridology reading. I want to make you aware of the first thing is there is a tendency for you to get drained from your essential minerals because of your stress. I also think you’re going to get drained on your B vitamins. I also think that you are going to need some more glandular support.
especially thyroid adrenals. I have a question mark around your pancreas, your liver gallbladder and spleen. Okay, that’s again based on those contraction furrows that you’re showing. You know, your minerals, you’re not holding your minerals and your B vitamins and that was kind of showed in the Dutch test around the bees.
Do you know about B3? So niacin is fantastic for your circulation. my God. It will dilate your blood vessels really, really nicely. But I think the point here is looking for maybe you’re taking this already a really good B complex and you’ve got to take more than the
the regular level building blood your berries blackberries cabbage grapes.
Sam Berne (28:46.743)
You might consider getting a Vitamix and doing a raw vegetable juice, which includes things like carrots and beets and greens and wheatgrass. What I tend to do is I find a I do a hot tea as my base. A really good tea for you would be something called oat straw tea.
Probably never heard of it. Oat straw tea is good for your bones. It’s got silicon in it. It’s good for your hair, but it’s a calming tea. And so as an example, you could brew that up, which is hot. You could add a little ginger and turmeric and lemon into your Vitamix. Beets are really good for the liver.
And then you can add like celery and cucumber. Cabbage would probably be good for you. So you’re getting a lot of really good plant enzymes, which is going to help your absorption and reduce your inflammation. know, probably cleansing your lymph would be helpful.
Well, we dry brushing walking. You could do a slant board where your head is below your feet or like a supported shoulder stand. Obviously things like, you know, massage or craniocic roll jumping on a rebounder, you know, whatever your exercise is.
You know, probably a combination of manual things and too much sitting is really bad for you. Like in your job. That’s again, your your edge is you got to keep your lymph moving because if you don’t it’s going to create this puddle in your body, which is all inflammation, you know, and that’s a killer, you know, so
Sam Berne (31:12.748)
plant enzymes, the lymph like you might take either chlorella or chlorophyll before you eat. It’s good for the liver as well. Detox. That might be one of your supplements. Okay. So just to recap, you know, if you’ve got a macular pucker or you’re suffering macular degeneration, it’s really important that you support your liver gallbladder health, not eat too much sugar. So support your pancreas thyroid, the glandular health.
is critically important. Also the lenses that you wear, you know, if you are wearing a distance prescription and you’re near sighted, you definitely need to wear something less when you’re working on screens and you know, so there’s a lot to this. So I hope you enjoyed the show. Thanks for tuning in. Take care everybody.
Keep Up with Dr. Sam
Website: https://www.drsamberne.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SamBerneOD/?…
Instagram: / samberneod
Twitter: / drsamberne
LinkedIn: / drsamberne
Dr. Sam Berne has been in private practice in New Mexico for over 25 years and where he works with patients to improve their vision and overall wellness through holistic methods. He holds a Bachelor of Science from Pennsylvania State University, Doctor of Optometry from Pennsylvania College, and did his postdoctoral work at the Gesell Institute in collaboration with Yale University. He has been awarded The Special Awards for Service from the Behavioral Optometrists in Mexico for his innovative and holistic work with children.
His protocols take a proactive, rather than reactive, approach to health and wellness. He understands and treats the body as one integrated system rather than a collection of independent organs in order to identify and address the root causes of disease. His whole health protocols improve vision and wellness by healing the mind-body-spirit through nutritional protocols, vision therapy, and self-care techniques. This views each person as genetically and biochemically unique and enables the individual to make lifelong improvements to their well-being.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS | More