Signs and Symptoms of Macular Degeneration

There are two types of macular degeneration, wet and dry. Neither of them cause pain.

• For dry AMD, the most common early sign is blurred vision. Often this blurred vision will go away in brighter light. If the loss of these light-sensing cells becomes great, people may see a small--but growing--blind spot in the middle of their field of vision.
• For wet AMD, the classic early symptom is that straight lines appear crooked. This results when fluid from the leaking blood vessels gathers and lifts the macula, distorting vision. A small blind spot may also appear in wet AMD, resulting in loss of one's central vision.