Jenny Wright attended the first Birdshot Day in 2010 where she ran a small art workshop where anyone could draw what they thought it was like looking through Birdshot Eyes. Jenny has since  published the attached paper which describes what she found out.

We thought that members of BUS  might like to have the opportunity to read  this and think about how you might depict what is going on in your eyes, as a way of keeping a record, or explaining your vision problems to your ophthalmologist.

This is how Jenny describes it:

“The paper explains the remit and outcomes of the drawing workshop at the Birdshot Patients Day in London, and includes some of the images that were produced.  As well as expressing what was going on in a patients eye,  it was also useful for medical students and other professionals to have a closer dialogue with those directly affected by Birdshot and helped them to understand the disease process and symptoms.”

The paper has been presented to a number of audiences and the drawings have been exhibited.  Jenny has quietly been helping us to get Birdshot Uveitis better known through this more unusual approach.

Jenny is running a similar workshop at the next Birdshot Day on Saturday 3rd March 2012 and she would love to see images of how you see.  So don’t be surprised if she asks you to sit down and make a drawing.  You don’t need to worry – you don’t have to have any drawing expertise or experience, and it might provide a little light relief to the days other activities.

Painter Susan Piper is also going to be exhibiting some of her paintings which have been inspired by medical images of  her own birdshot eyes.  We hope to have more about this in a later news item.