EUROPEAN OPHTHALMIC REVIEW – VOLUME 6 ISSUE 1 – SPRING 2012

Ocular tumours are rare; however, they are the only ocular disease that can lead to mortality. Among the intraocular tumours, uveal melanoma is the most common tumour among Caucasians. In spite of a high success rate in treating the primary melanoma of the eye, mortality is still high and reaches 30–50 % in 15 years.

Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is a noninvasive, objective optical modality providing cross-sectional images of in vivo tissue at a micrometer resolution scale.1 Since the first reports of its use in ophthalmology by Puliafito and Fujimoto in 1991,1 OCT has been widely used and it is now one of the most useful devices in ophthalmic clinical […]

Conventional trabeculectomy has so far remained the gold standard for glaucoma surgery, despite its potential vision-threatening complications.1 Efforts are being made to develop a new surgical approach to overcome the limited success rate and safety issues of the traditional trabeculectomy. The pioneering work of Krasnov2 and the various modifications that succeeded it2–10 led to the […]

Purpose The aim of this study was to demonstrate the efficacy and safety of a new surgical procedure termed high-frequency deep sclerotomy ab interno (HFDS) (formerly STT) for the treatment of primary open-angle glaucoma and juvenile glaucoma. Patients and Methods

High-frequency deep sclerotomy (HFDS) glaucoma surgery is a new ab interno procedure to lower the intraocular pressure in open-angle glaucoma. Using high-frequency energy, six small pockets are formed which significantly reduce the outflow resistance for aqueous humour. The pockets penetrate through the trabecular meshwork and Schlemm’s canal and end in the sclera.

Six decades have passed since the first implantation of an artificial intraocular lens (IOL) into a human eye. Since then, cataract and refractive surgery have developed into the most frequent and most successful surgical interventions in the history of medicine. Every year more than 11 Mio lenses are implanted worldwide, providing excellent chances for the […]

Intravitreal drugs are currently approved for the treatment of both age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and macular oedema resulting from diabetes or vein occlusion. However, the major drawback of these drugs and/or an intravitreal monotherapy strategy is the need for repeated injections, with most of the drugs requiring injections on a monthly to bimonthly basis. In […]

Triamcinolone acetonide (TA) is a synthetic steroid of the glucocorticoid family with a fluorine in the ninth position.1 It is commercially available as an ester and represents one of the most commonly used steroid agents for the treatment of several retinal conditions.2

In developed nations, age-related macular degeneration (AMD) has been the principal cause of severe vision loss and blindness among people aged over 50 years.1–3 AMD can be classified into dry and wet types. Angiogenesis is a key feature of neovascular AMD (nvAMD), the wet type of advanced AMD, characterised by haemorrhagic or serous liquid leakage […]

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the major cause of irreversible vision loss in adults in developed countries.1–3 Data from the European eye study (EUREYE) indicate that the prevalence of AMD in Europeans aged 65 years and over is 3.3 %.4 Approximately 30 % of individuals aged 75 or older have the mild or intermediate stage […]

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the leading cause of severe visual acuity (VA) loss in industrialised countries and its prevalence is increasing with the aging population.1,2 There are two forms of the disease – dry AMD and exudative AMD. Dry AMD is associated with drusen early on, followed by atrophy of the macula during the […]

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is the leading cause of irreversible vision loss in adults aged over 50 years in developed countries1,2 and, given the ageing of the populations of these countries, its prevalence is likely to increase dramatically over the coming years.3,4

Uveal melanoma is the most common primary intraocular malignancy in adults and comprises approximately 85 % of all ocular melanomas.1 With current clinical examination techniques, the accuracy of clinical diagnosis of uveal melanoma exceeds 99 %.2 This is in sharp contrast to other systemic malignancies for which biopsy remains the gold standard for diagnostic confirmation. […]