Why the macula?

The regional susceptibility of the retina to diseases has been well known by clinicians for many years. It is surprising that the implications of these observations have not spawned major research efforts to characterise the structural and functional attributes of the outer retina in different regions of a foveate retina. Without such an effort, the understanding of the disease mechanisms in retinal dystrophies will remain limited and may hamper therapeutic efforts. That outer retinal disease is responsible for over 50% of blind registration in the western world underlines the importance of these considerations.