Eye Health News and Research

Latest Eye Health News and Research

Facial asymmetry persists despite surgery to correct congenital deformity

Adults and teens that underwent surgery as infants to correct a congenital condition that causes the forehead and face to appear uneven still have a degree of facial asymmetry years later, according to new research led by a Hasbro Children's Hospital surgeon.

27 Feb 2008

Blindness after ophthalmic surgery

The injection of gas into the eye, as is performed in various ophthalmic surgical procedures, can cause blindness by expanding the eye.

27 Feb 2008

Mechanism of blood clot elasticity revealed in high definition

Blood clots can save lives, staunching blood loss after injury, but they can also kill. Let loose in the bloodstream, a clot can cause a heart attack, stroke or pulmonary embolism.

26 Feb 2008

Small protein discovered that specifically recognizes tumors responding to chemotherapy

A technique that specifically "tags" tumors responding to chemotherapy may offer a new strategy for determining a cancer treatment's effectiveness within days of starting treatment, according to a new study by Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center investigators.

26 Feb 2008

New metabolic imaging instrument shows promise as screening device in diabetes and other major eye diseases

Scientists at the University of Michigan have shown that their new metabolic imaging instrument can accurately detect eye disease at a very early stage.

26 Feb 2008

New minimal incision techniques for foot and ankle surgery

Many patients who undergo foot and ankle surgery are recovering faster and with smaller surgical scars, thanks to new minimal incision techniques and tools.

21 Feb 2008

New way to grow blood vessels

Researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute have found a previously unknown molecular pathway in mice that spurs the growth of new blood vessels when body parts are jeopardized by poor circulation.

21 Feb 2008

A new age-related macular degeneration discovery

Scientists have won a major battle in the fight against age-related macular degeneration, or AMD, a blinding eye disease that affects millions of people.

21 Feb 2008

Scientists shed light on long-distance signaling in developing neurons

A longstanding puzzle in neurodevelopment may have yielded up a key secret.

20 Feb 2008

Ocular melanoma - potential new treatment options

Ocular melanoma is rarely detected before it has grown large enough to impair vision or to metastasize.

20 Feb 2008

Stereotypes and misinformation about HIV still commonplace in healthcare

The doctor who wouldn't come into the patient's hospital room. The neurologist who avoided eye contact. The ambulance attendant who angrily threw her bloodied gloves into the street after learning the injured patient was HIV-positive.

20 Feb 2008

Biannual mass antibiotic treatment may help reduce contagious eye disease trachoma in Africa

Changing the administration of the antibiotic azithromycin from once to twice a year in villages in Ethiopia substantially reduced eye infections in preschool children caused by chlamydia, which causes the serious, contagious eye disease trachoma, according to a study in the February 20 issue of JAMA.

20 Feb 2008

New key finding in neurodevelopment

A longstanding puzzle in neurodevelopment may have yielded up a key secret. A team led by scientists at Weill Cornell Medical College says they have determined how events at the very tips of the developing neuron's long, skinny axon affect gene transcription back in the cell's distant nucleus.

20 Feb 2008

Role gound for glaucoma gene and a signaling pathway

Researchers have found that a gene and a related signaling pathway play a role in the development of glaucoma, which is a common cause of visual impairment and blindness worldwide.

18 Feb 2008

Discovery of new cataract gene

The international team of researchers was able to identify the location and defect in the coding region of the gene through analysis of genetic material (DNA) from members of a large Swiss family, the majority of whom suffered from autosomal dominant juvenile cataract.

17 Feb 2008

Insights into the physics of brain activity

The same rules of physics that govern molecules as they condense from gas to liquid, or freeze from liquid to solid, also apply to the activity patterns of neurons in the human brain.

17 Feb 2008

Researchers explain why Avastin can cause potentially fatal brain inflammation

New research by scientists at Schepens Eye Research Institute may help explain why the anti-cancer drug Avastin, which targets a growth factor responsible for creation of new blood vessels, causes potentially fatal brain inflammation in certain patients.

14 Feb 2008

Predicting astronauts from radiation

European scientists have developed the most accurate method yet for predicting the doses of radiation that astronauts will receive aboard the orbiting European laboratory module, Columbus, attached to the ISS this week.

14 Feb 2008

Tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy surgery improves quality of life for children with sleep apnea

For children who suffer from obstructive sleep apnea (OSA), a tonsillectomy and adenoidectomy can provide dramatic relief and is successful in solving sleep problems for 80 to 90 percent of children, a Saint Louis University study found.

13 Feb 2008

White seniors more likely to have signs of future eye disease than black seniors

White individuals older than 65 are more likely than black individuals to have characteristics that indicate they will develop more advanced forms of the eye disease age-related macular degeneration (AMD), according to a report in the February issue of Archives of Ophthalmology.

12 Feb 2008