Inventor of Cataracts Treatment Dies at 76

Patricia Bath, an ophthalmologist who patented the Laserphaco Probe in 1988, has died at age 76.

With the tool — its name is short for short for laser photoablative cataract surgery — Bath became the “first African American female doctor to receive a medical patent,” the Washington Post reports.

Bath worked on the ophthalmology team at UCLA Medical Center until retiring in 1993.

She was a co-founder, in 1976, of the American Institute for the Prevention of Blindness.

In all, she held five U.S. patents.

Bath died in San Francisco from complications of cancer.

Read more at the Washington Post