A while ago I was diagnosed with late onset type II diabetes. Currently it’s not a problem but it is does leave me slightly vulnerable to other long term ailments. Luckily enough the NHS are pretty good at providing help to make sure any problems are caught early and dealt with. One of the more serious risks is diabetic retinopathy, a retinal degeneration that eventually can lead to blindness. Early detection is the best way to manage this condition but it’s tricky as it has no early warning signs.
For that reason the NHS offers yearly retinal digital screenings for diabetics. The process is very quick as all it really entails is having a digital photo taken of your retina. You sit in chair with your chin on a rest to keep your head steady as the camera is put into place. You see a green spot which you’re asked to focus on until you the flash goes off and the picture is taken. The room is really dark so the flash is a little bit of a shock and leaves a pretty big afterimage for about 30 seconds after.
Apparently it’s a little more stressful if you’re visiting a hospital in England. Your pupils need to be dilated to get the best shot and that’s why the room is darkened but in England they’re much more likely to rely on eye drops to do this.
At then end of the very quick appointment I asked the guy taking the pictures if I could get copies of them which he very nicely sent to me this morning and here they are 
The white blob with where the veins are intersecting is my optic nerve and the dark blob on the other side of the eye is the macula. I’ve no idea what it does but apparently it’s pretty important too 
These pictures now go off to a specialist to look at and if there is something not quite right I should hear in the next six weeks or so. The images are stored and when I get my next screening next year they use this years images as baseline to measure any changes in my eyes.
