Facebook Users Helped Save This Little Girl's Vision After Looking at This Photo
A Memphis mother got a lot more than Facebook likes and warm comments on the social medium when she posted a glowing picture of her 3-year-old daughter. Reactions from a few friends led to a revelation that her daughter was slowly going blind in one eye.
In the photo, pictured above, Taylor's daughter, Rylee, appears to have a glow in her left eye. While most people assumed that the glow was due to light from the camera used to take the picture, a few friends knew better.
"They said: 'Hey, I'm sure it's nothing. It's probably the lighting, but your daughter's eye is glowing and you might want to have it checked out because it's a sign there could be an issue with her eye,'" Taylor told Memphis, Tenn., news outlet WREG.
Taylor took the advice of her friends and took Rylee to see a retina specialist at the Baptist Eye Clinic where the young girl was diagnosed with Coat's disease – a rare condition which causes vision loss or blindness in one eye.
Dr. Jorge Calzada of the Charles Retina Institute and Baptist Eye Clinic said the discovery was a boon for Rylee because the earlier children get treatment for the disease, the better off they will be.
"The significant problem we have with children is that a child won't say, 'Mommy, I can't see out of my right eye.' It is usually caught in an expected way, when a child recognizes he cannot see or the parent recognizes they cannot see. It's often because they've lost vision in both eyes," Dr. Calzada explained.
Rylee's mother said she was in complete darkness about her daughter's condition because she did not demonstrate that she was having any trouble with her vision.
"She didn't sit close to the TV. She is actually in gymnastics and can walk on the balance beam," said Taylor, who added that she is grateful to the friends who pointed out the problem to her because it saved her daughter's vision.