My name is Lawrence Lazare and I suffer from Stargardt Disease a rare genetic eye disease which is causing me to lose my central vision. A person with Stargardt usually starts to suffer vision loss as a child or an early adult, while I only started to lose my vision in my late 50’s. Stargardt Disease is similar to Macular Degeneration in terms of how it impacts the retina, but unlike MD, there is currently no cure or treatment for Stargardt’s.
While Stargardt’s itself is a rare disease (it’s estimated that less than 1 in 10,000 people have the disease), vision loss affects a growing percentage of the population. It’s estimated that within the United States alone, that in the next decade, the number of people living with vision loss will double to nearly 20 million people.
This site is meant to be a tool to share my experience with vision loss, how it impacts me, how I have had to adapt to going legally blind, as well as being a resource for sharing information, tools, tips, and tricks, and other information related to Stargardt Disease and vision loss in general.