### How to Detect and Confirm Diabetic Macular Edema (DME) and Monitor Your Eyes at Home Diabetic macular edema (DME) often doesn't cause noticeable symptoms, so you might not know you have it. Regular eye exams can help catch it early and prevent long-term damage to your vision. #### Home Monitoring You can check your eyes with an Amsler grid. It's a simple chart with lines and a dot in the center. Look at the chart with one eye closed and then the other. If you have DME, the lines might look wavy instead of straight. This doesn't replace an eye exam by your doctor, but it can alert you to potential issues. #### Professional Eye Exams It's best to see an eye doctor (an ophthalmologist or an optometrist) trained to diagnose and treat people with diabetes. Here are some common tests they might use: 1. **Visual Acuity Testing**: This checks for vision loss using a series of eye charts to see how well you can see at different distances. 2. **Dilated Eye Exam**: Your doctor will use eyedrops to dilate your pupils, allowing more light in so they can see inside your eye. They will look at the retina for problems like leaking blood vessels and swelling. 3. **Retinal Imaging**: This takes pictures of the back of your eye and sends them to a computer for an eye doctor to check for signs of disease. 4. **Fluorescein Angiography**: If DME is suspected, a special dye is injected into a vein in your arm. It travels to your eye, making blood vessels show up on digital photos. 5. **Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT)**: This uses light waves to create detailed images of tissues inside your eye, showing the thickness of different layers in your retina and finding problems that other tests can't. #### When to Get Eye Exams - **Type 1 Diabetes**: Get your first eye exam within 5 years of diagnosis. - **Type 2 Diabetes**: Get an eye exam soon after diagnosis, as you may already have DME. - **Pregnancy**: Get your eyes checked before trying to get pregnant or in the first trimester. You may need more tests during and after pregnancy. Generally, you should have an eye exam every year, or every 2 years if you don't have diabetic retinopathy. If diagnosed with an eye disease, your doctor may want to see you more often.