Forum > Blogs > Mario Kart DS saved a kid's eyesight...I can relate to it (Personal story)
Mario Kart DS saved a kid's eyesight...I can relate to it (Personal story)
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Sun, 27 Jun 2010 01:25:55
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Just thought this was interesting.

According to Kotaku, a doctor prescribed playing Mario Kart DS to save this kid's eye.

http://kotaku.com/5573150/mario-kart-saved-my-eyesight

A British youth overcame what is called "lazy eye syndrome" thanks to a doctor's prescription of Mario Kart DS, restoring his right eye from "near blindness" to a 250 percent improvement.         

At age 5, Ben Michaels was diagnosed with ambylopia in his right eye, which results in a steady decline in vision in that eyeball. Untreated he would have gone completely blind in it. His doctor, however, told Ben to play Mario Kart DS with an eye patch, which trained the "lazy" one to work harder and thus to improve.

I can relate to this kid. A little interesting tidbit of myself, but I had something similar on my left eye which I spent most of my years as a kid wearing a eye patch on my right. I had to do this to strengthen my left eye from going blind.

It worked but I had to wear the patch everywhere I went, to school, outside in public, and home...everywhere. Yeah, you can imagine the teasing I got. But to be honest, they weren't that cruel to me.

This kid played Mario Kart 2 hours a day but I had to wear this patch for years. But unlike this kid, my left eye didn't improve that much. To this day, I'm still almost blind but what the patch did was prevent me from being cross-eyed.

If only I had a DS back in the day. Maybe my eye would've been better. Anyway, just thought this article was interesting.
Edited: Sun, 27 Jun 2010 01:30:47

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Now Playing: Golden Sun Dark Dawn, God of War Ghost of Sparta, and DKC Returns

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Sun, 27 Jun 2010 01:29:49
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My wife had something similar to what you have, but even with the patch she ended up cross eyed. A few years ago she got cosmetic surgery to fix the eye. It still doesn't really do much for her vision, but it does look normal now.  

It's interesting how video games can actually help this though. I remember reading an article similar to this years ago in Nintendo Power about how playing games actually strengthened a kid's eye sight and his doctor ended up prescribing him to play an hour a day to keep it up.

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Sun, 27 Jun 2010 19:01:12
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Very interesting story, I didn't know you can work the eye out in that way.
660896.png
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Sun, 27 Jun 2010 23:45:11
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I guess the patch and the video game work out in the same way (with the patch not creating bad habits and the game reinforcing good ones).  


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Mon, 28 Jun 2010 08:37:49
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Teased for wearing an eyepatch? I can't think of many things more epic!

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Mon, 28 Jun 2010 14:35:22
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Sorry to be the insensitve one here, but from now on ASK, you can either be called Patch or the Pirate. The choice is yours.

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Mon, 28 Jun 2010 20:37:54
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gamingeek said:
Sorry to be the insensitve one here, but from now on ASK, you can either be called Patch or the Pirate. The choice is yours.

Hrm

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Mon, 28 Jun 2010 20:40:26
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I have some exercises for your eye, ASK. The brown eye. LOL 
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Mon, 28 Jun 2010 20:44:32
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SteelAttack said:
I have some exercises for your eye, ASK. The brown eye. LOL

Huh?

Maybe I'm slow but I don't get it.

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Now Playing: Golden Sun Dark Dawn, God of War Ghost of Sparta, and DKC Returns

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Tue, 29 Jun 2010 08:47:33

ASK_Story said:

Huh?

Maybe I'm slow but I don't get it.

He wants to anally penetrate you. Nyaa

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Tue, 29 Jun 2010 20:56:11

Patch it is. Grinning

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