Surgery

Philadelphia-A new silicone IOL and a new hydrophobic acrylate lens are both easy and safe to implant, offering reliable refraction for patients with high myopia and high hyperopia, said Gerd U. Auffarth, MD, at the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery annual meeting here.

Philadelphia-Incorrect lens power continues to top the list as the most common reason for IOL explantation, followed by dislocation/decentration, reported Nick Mamalis, MD, at the annual meeting of the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery (ASCRS) here.

Philadelphia-Patients with high myopia and high hyperopia seemed to have a good response to the implantation of the Phakic Refractive Lens (PRL, Medennium Inc.), according to Kenneth J. Hoffer, MD, who reported on the phase III trial for myopia and the phase II trial for hyperopia during the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery meeting here.

Philadelphia-Most of the patients treated for high myopia with the Implantable Contact Lens (ICL, STAAR Surgical) were satisfied with their vision at the 2-year follow-up, said John A. Vukich, MD, who reported the interim results of the FDA clinical trial during the American Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgery annual meeting.

Seattle-The body's natural wound-healing processes that repair a cornea scraped by a tree branch might interfere with the outcome of a LASIK procedure, according to Steven E. Wilson, MD.

More than 1.5 million cataract surgery procedures are performed each year in the United States. Currently, cataract surgery is one of the most safe and effective surgical procedures in all of medicine.

Researchers presented new strategies for tack-ling numerous retinal diseases that can have devastating effects on vision in a symposium entitled "New Vessels, New Medicines, New Ideas in Retina." Great progress has been made and con-tinues to be made in this subspecialty, noted Harry W. Flynn Jr., MD, organizer of the 2001 American Academy of Ophthalmology symposium.

New Orleans-The tarsal "sandwich" technique facilitates cosmetic repair of lower eyelid malpositions caused by trauma or infection. The reconstruction surgery offers a cosmetically pleasing result and is among the most difficult challenges for the surgeon, according to Richard J. Hesse, MD, author of a recent report on the subject. The tarsal sandwich procedure is for pa-tients whose malpo-sitions do not respond favorably to standard methods.

Hong Kong-The success rate following intranasal endoscopic dacryocystorhinostomy in Chinese patients is similar to that in Caucasian patients, based on the results of a retrospective study of patients with nasolacrimal duct obstruction, according to Lawrence Lam, MD.

The search for an ideal soft tissue filler to cor-rect various facial folds and wrinkles has gone on for years. At the turn of the last century, injectable paraffin was tried but quickly found to be unacceptable.1 A refined form of liquid silicone was introduced in the 1960s, and for the next 30 years, various forms of injectable silicone were used with few reported complications. Unfortunately, numerous complications arose from the use of adulterated or impure silicones and as a result, injectable silicones were abandoned.2

Vancouver, British Columbia-The FDA recently approved the injection of botulinum toxin type A (Botox Cosmetic, Allergan, Irvine, CA) to treat moderate to severe glabellar lines in adults under age 65.

The need for surgical repair of a single severed lacrimal canaliculus is somewhat controversial, largely because the relative roles of the upper and lower canaliculi have not been clearly established or appreciated.

Boston-Selective laser trabeculoplasty (SLT) could potentially be used as a first-line therapy for primary open-angle glaucoma (POAG)because it is much less traumatic to the eye than the currently used argon laser trabeculoplasty (ALT), according to its inventor, Mark Latina, MD.

Despite considerable effort and expense, new technology has yet to yield an incisional instrument better than the traditional steel blade for use in ophthalmic and facial plastic surgery.

San Francisco-Pars plana injection of viscoelastic is an excellent technique for managing the difficult problem of a posteriorly dislocated IOL. By levitating the IOL forward, this maneuver can facilitate IOL suturing or exchange through an anterior segment approach, according to David F. Chang, MD.

Los Angeles-A new marker is available that allows added precision for orientation of the eye during LASIK.

N onpenetrating glaucoma surgery in expert hands is as efficacious as trabeculectomy for controlling IOP but results in significantly fewer complications, said Tarek M. Shaarawy, MD.

Philadelphia-A case-control study-in which each patient served as his or her own control-found that a single-piece lens may be less likely to cause vision-troubling capsular striae than a multipiece lens, said Richard Tipperman, MD.

System enhancements may put surgery times closer to standard phaco fordense cataract

Salt Lake City-The Photon Laser and Phaco Workstation (Paradigm Medical Industries, Salt Lake City) lets surgeons use either laser or ultrasound to remove a cataract, with the ability of switching back and forth between the two modalities.

Athens, Greece-A novel technique can remove any type of cataract through two small paracenteses, using almost half the energy necessary in traditional phacoemulsification techniques.

Surgical maneuvers used to treat pseudotumor cerebri include some formof shunt procedure, such as a lumboperitoneal shunt, a ventriculoperitonealshunt, or optic nerve sheath decompression (ONSD). Shunting procedures areultimately designed to divert the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) that is underpressure away from the neuro-ocular junction, where hydrodynamic forcescompress ganglion cells and their blood supply, leading to injury and/ordeath of these cells.

Although emergency room physicians and general plastic surgeons may sometimes feel comfortable repairing simple eyelid lacerations, any laceration in the medial portion of the eyelid almost always results in an ophthalmology consult to evaluate for a canalicular laceration.