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Top-Ten 33rd Annual Scientific Congress of the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Ophthalmologists
October 28-November 1, 2001, Adelaide, Australia
Anne Brooks
- Marty Wax gave a plenary session 'Glaucoma Update' in a satellite videoconference. He stated that intraocular pressure lowering is the best neuropro-tectant we have. The importance of caspases in cell death was discussed. Tumor necrosis inhibitor was discussed under new therapies; it is implicated in rheumatoid arthritis and other autoimmune disorders.
- Bill Morgan delivered a paper on changes in the force required for retinal venous pulsation in glaucoma. He found that glaucoma patients have significantly less spontaneous venous pulsation: 44% compared with 74% in glaucoma suspects and normals. The ophthalmodynanometric force required to induce venous pulsation is higher in patients with worse visual field defects. That is, the intraocular pressure at which venous pulsation occurs is higher in patients with more severe visual field defects. These results imply that glaucoma patients develop a relative stenosis in the central retinal vein.
- Stuart Graham reported on objective visual fields obtained by recording visual evoked potentials with the Accumap system. It is possible to identify field loss in glaucoma, determine reliable fields in subjects who are poor performers on subjective testing, and confirm defects in borderline and early glaucoma cases. Patients with optic neuritis show latency delays as well as signal reductions.
- Eric Chai, working with Ivan Goldberg and Alok Sharma, reported a prospective randomized crossover trial of the effects of timolol and betaxolol on visual field sensitivities before and after a vasospastic stimulus in glaucoma patients. Topical betaxolol was associated with a significantly smaller reduction in arcuate visual field sensitivity and a higher mean sensitivity in the arcuate visual fields after a hand vibration stimulus, compared with timolol. This may reflect a protective effect of betaxolol against systemic and ocular vasos pasm provoked by a hand vibration stimulus in patients with a vasospastic tendency.
- Julian Rait reported on visual field progression in open-angle glaucoma in the Melbourne Visual Impairment Project. Three methods were used to assess visual field progression: the Advanced Glaucoma Intervention Study, the modified Anderson criteria, and the Blumenthal method. He concluded that visual field progression in open-angle glaucoma is associated with severity of disease, whereby the visual field is more likely to progress the more definite the condition.
- Achim Krauss reported on the pharmacology of Bimatoprost and concluded that this appears to mimic the intraocular-lowering activity of the recently discovered substances called prostamides.
- Ivan Goldberg reported on a one-year comparison of the new prostamide AGN 192024 (Bimatoprost) with timolol in the management of glaucoma and ocular hypertension. Bimatoprost QD provides a statistically significant, clinically relevant, long-term intraocular pressure lowering superior to timolol BID, and is safe and well tolerated in patients with glaucoma or ocular hypertension.
- Julian Rait reported a three-month comparison of Bimatoprost with latanoprost in patients with elevated intracoular pressure. Bimatoprost provides excellent diurnal intraocular pressure control. More patients reach low target pressures with Bimatoprost than with latanoprost, suggesting that Bimatoprost is more effective than latanoprost in patients with glaucoma or ocular hypertension.
The Australasian Ophthalmic and Visual Science Meeting was held at the University of Sydney on 7th-9th December, 2001. Basic sciences were the theme. There was a poster presentation on central retinal vein occlusion in pseudoexfoliation of the lens capsule by Bill Gillies and Anne Brooks. This revealed some interesting findings regarding the incidence of central retinal vein occlusion in pseudoexfoliation and perhaps in glaucoma in general.
