New technology opens the eyes of world experts

Leading international medical experts have visited the University of Kent at Canterbury (UKC) to make final preparations for transferring a revolutionary technology of diagnostic eye examination equipment to Asahikawa Medical College in Japan.

Susumu Oshima and Toshio Murata from Nidek Japan (Nidek is the largest ophthalmic instrument company in Japan) spent four days at UKC with Professor David Jackson, Dr Adrian Podoleanu and Dr John Rogers who have achieved international reputation for their development of an instrument known as an Optical Dual Channel Tomograph.

The inventive breakthrough from the Applied Optics Group at UKC is the third instrument they have constructed with research funds from Canadian-based Ophthalmic Technologies Inc (OTI), Rishard Weitz, president of OTI said: ‘This is the first time that Canadian and Japanese companies together with a Japanese university have collaborated with a British university in this type of research, thus enabling the theoretical knowledge and expertise at UKC to make an impact on a medical science internationally’.

Although the technology is still in its early stages, it is already being used by ophthalmologists and researchers at New York`s famous Eye and Ear Infirmary as well as the Retina Research Macula Foundation in New York and now the Asahikawa Medical College in northern Japan.