ARVO puts spotlight on imaging

Take-home

Optical coherence tomography continues to hold focus at ophthalmic imaging conferences, including next month’s meeting of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology.

ARVO View By Katrina Norfleet

Advances in the field of ophthalmic imaging continue to hold the focus of clinicians, whether it is a recent briefing on Capitol Hill or the annual meeting of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO) next month in Seattle.

Last month’s briefing by the Alliance for Eye and Vision Research during World Glaucoma Week in Washington, DC, aimed to educate Congress and the public about the value of optical coherence tomography (OCT) in fighting the leading cause of blindness.

Gadi Wollstein, MD, featured speaker and ARVO member, stressed the need to detect glaucoma and its progression as early as possible in order to start or modify treatment. Structural changes in the optic nerve and retinal nerve fiber layer may be predictive of glaucoma and how valuable OCT is in measuring these changes, he explained.

To demonstrate that OCT is a non-invasive, high-speed technology, the briefing included real-time imaging of congressional staff members’ eyes.

“OCT has been the most rapidly adopted technology in eye care,” Dr. Wollstein said.

He shared that OCT was initially developed with National Institutes of Health funding and its use today complements the National Eye Institute’s portfolio of research into the development of diagnostics and therapies for use in the clinical setting.

Upcoming imaging events

2013 ISIE/Imaging Conference

Saturday, May 4

Sheraton Seattle Hotel

The 2013 ARVO-ISIE/Imaging Conference is a 1-day forum where clinicians can learn more about the latest developments in the ophthalmic imaging field. The conference, which takes place the day before the ARVO annual meeting, will include sessions and posters-with exhibitors on site to demonstrate state-of-the-art-advances in imaging.

Session topics will include:

• Glaucoma

• Retina

• Cornea and anterior segment

• Advanced retinal imaging methods

• OCT

• Adaptive optics (AO)

• Functional imaging, Doppler imaging

• Ultrasound and magnetic resonance imaging

Visit arvo.org/isie to register for the imaging conference or additional information.

OCT, AO breakthroughs

ARVO/Champalimaud Award Lecture

Tuesday, May 7

5:30 to 6:45 pm

Five ARVO members received the prestigious 2012 António Champalimaud Vision Award: James Fujimoto, PhD; David Huang, MD, PhD; Carmen Puliafito, MD; Joel Schuman, MD, FARVO; and David R. Williams, PhD, FARVO. Eric Swanson, MS, was also a recipient.

The awardees were recognized for the development of two novel approaches to visualizing the living human retina in health and disease: OCT and AO technologies.

The collaboration among Drs. Fujimoto, Huang, Puliafito, and Schuman is responsible for the development of OCT into a practical clinical tool that has become a standard of care in ophthalmology for diagnosing and treating age-related macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, and glaucoma.

According to Dr. Schuman, “It is now the most commonly performed ophthalmic diagnostic procedure, with millions of procedures performed annually.”

Dr. Williams’ application of AO technologies to the eye brings retinal cells into sharp focus by correcting for natural optical imperfections of the cornea and lens-helping people see better.

“AO is also being used worldwide in refractive surgery and to design new IOLs and contact lens,” Dr. Williams said. “It’s transformed the whole field of vision correction.”

ARVO annual meeting attendees are invited to the ARVO/Champalimaud Award lecture, where award winners Dr. Fujimoto and Williams will discuss their research and implications on future therapies.

Functional, structural OCT

Friedenwald Award Lecture

Wednesday, May 8

6:30 to 7:15 p.m.

Clinicians have an opportunity to find out what’s next in the area of functional OCT from awardee David Huang, MD, PhD, whose research in the development of OCT technology revolutionized the field of ophthalmic imaging. He was the first to recognize that cross-sectional images could be generated and displayed in false color by scanning the laser measurement beam, thus inventing OCT.

author info

Katrina Norfleet is senior writer, communications, for the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology. Readers may contact her at 240/221-2924 or knorfleet@arvo.org.

2013 ARVO Meeting

For more information on events at the upcoming ARVO 2013 annual meeting, May 5 to 9 in Seattle, visit arvo.org/am.