Naresh Mandava, MD, makes it his department's mission to offer hope for patients who are losing, or have lost, their vision
Relieving the burden of blindness - whether through drug-delivering lens implants, vision-restorative retinal transplants or AI-assisted diagnostics - ranks high on the bucket lists of University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus scientists.
For the past two decades, the CU Anschutz School of Medicine's Department of Ophthalmology has established itself as a national leader in innovation and groundbreaking research, winning 60 patents and inventing and licensing at least 13 technologies in the past five years alone. This spring, the department received a historic $40 million gift to continue advancing treatments and seeking potential cures to diseases such as glaucoma and macular degeneration.
"Many of these diseases affect people in the prime of their lives," said Naresh Mandava, MD, department chair, explaining the driving force behind the desire to meet the unmet clinical needs for patients who are losing, or have lost, their sight. "The accompanying blindness - losing their ability to read, to drive, to recognize the faces of loved ones - is devastating. You lose independence. You lose a lot of yourself."
Never Dream Alone, a newly launched advertising campaign, highlights the work of Naresh Mandava, MD, and his team along with other members of the CU Anschutz community. A special project done in collaboration with the Colorado Symphony, the ad campaign underscores how great things come when people work together. See related stories:
In the following Q&A, Mandava talks about his work and highlights some of the ways the Department of Ophthalmology and the state-of-the-art UCHealth Sue Anschutz-Rodgers Eye Center are transforming eye care.
