WAEH Newsletter – July 2021
Call for Abstracts now open!
The 15th Annual WAEH meeting: 8 September 2021
Because of the ongoing global coronapandemic, the WAEH board has decided to organize The 15th Annual WAEH Meeting online. The meeting will be hosted by the St Erik Eye Hospital (Sweden) and the Wilmer Eye Institute – Johns Hopkins (USA). Main theme: EyeHospital Design.
2021 – Forward together – Developing the Eye Care of the Future
The Eye Hospital of the Future:
- Background philosophy behind building new and flexible eyehospitals
- Adaptability to new challenges and technical developments: the impact of technology on buildings
- Designing new eyehospitals: developing healthy environments for patients and employees
- The building process – To move to a new hospital building – Lessons learned
Date: Wednesday 8 September
Time: 13.00 – 15.00 CET (Stockholm time)
Member meeting: 15.00 – 15.30 CET (Stockholm time)
Call for Abstracts deadline: 30 July 2021
Read more here
2021 – Call for projects
Each year 2 to 3 projects are led by our member eye hospitals to help shape and improve ophthalmic care on a global scale. Each project can be budgeted with a budget of 7.500 euro. This is paid from the fees of the WAEH membership. We would like to invite you again to share your project ideas.
Current projects are the WAEH Medical Outcome project and the WAEH Clinician Burn out project.
What about the Project Groups?
- They are WAEH Member-led
- They collaborate on specific themes from Artificial intelligence to Medical outcomes
- They network and brainstorm via online Zoom meetings to maximise the impact and reach of sharing knowledge during the projects
- They share their lessons learned, knowledge and experience also via the WAEH knowledge hub and via the WAEH newsletter
- They host a round table and present their project during the Annual Meeting
Examples of WAEH projects:
· WAEH Medical outcome project + results
· Development of an international procedure of applying eye drops
· Management of AMD Patients
· RedefinIng the patient flow of Glaucoma patients
Ideas are welcome!
Do you have an idea of something you would like to change or innovate in your Eyehospital? Want to run a WAEH project?
Send in your project proposal! Check out the project proposal format.
For an example, see the project proposal about the Patient Enucleation Education Package – a project ran by Mitchell Wilson from the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital from Melbourne in the most excellent way: project proposal Patient Enucleation Education Package.
Or contact Maaike van Zuilen: maaike.vanzuilen@waeh.org
On the Hub: WAEH 20 May webinar presentations + recording
The presentations and recording of the 20 May ‘Education in Eye Hospitals’ webinar are now online!
Watch the presentations here
Watch the recording here
Updated Login details – Knowledge Hub
From now on the Hub no longer has a personal login, but now the hub has a central login for all members. You can contact Maaike van Zuilen at: maaike.vanzuilen@waeh.org to request the login details.
RVEEH / Melbourne:
7 June – 9 July 2021
2022 Graduate Nursing Program applications open
The Eye and Ear Graduate Nurse Program 2022 opens for applications Monday 7 June 2021 and close on Friday 9 July 2021.
The program facilitates the development of graduate nurses to become clinically competent in nursing. This includes developing professional relationships and delivering safe patient care in a supportive, professional working environment.
The graduate program offers significant opportunities for learning:
- A comprehensive one-week orientation program followed by 5 full study days scheduled throughout the year.
- All study days involve presentations and discussions incorporating professional development and clinical nursing.
- An extensive online education program. This includes mandatory learning activities for all nursing staff, consisting of both learning modules and practical assessments
- Regular In-service sessions.
Applications for our 2022 Graduate Nurse Program are open Monday 7 June and close Friday 9 July. Apply here.
Click here for further information on the Program and application proces
Source: The Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital, Melbourne
Date: 3 June 2021
3 September 2021
The 32nd annual conference “Orenburg Conference of Ophthalmologists”
Orenburg branch of S. Fyodorov Eye Microsurgery Federal State Institution will hold the 32nd annual conference “Orenburg Conference of Ophthalmologists” on September 3, 2021 and Prof. Alexander Chuprov would like to invite WAEH members to present a video of an interesting eye operation with comments of a surgeon.
The theme is “Innovative approaches in Eye Surgery: cornea, lens, retina”
Length of video: 7 – 10 minutes
It is advisable to give the text sounding off-screen in Word format: The Orenburg Eye Institution will make subtitles for those who don’t understand English.
We are looking for one more WAEH member to participate!
Interested? Send an e-mail to: Maaike.vanzuilen@waeh.org and/or nauka@ofmntk.ru
The deadline is August, 5th
Source: Orenburg branch of S. Fyodorov Eye Microsurgery Federal State Institution
Mount Sinai Ophthalmologists Develop New Technique to Assess Progression of Sickle Cell Retinopathy
Breakthrough technology may help prevent vision loss and understand effectiveness of therapy
Dr. Javed Farooqui first joined the Orbis family in 2
Image: A treatment naïve SCD patient with HbSS genotype was imaged at an initial visit (left column) and repeated imaging again after two months of hydroxyurea treatment (right column). Before treatment, the patient exhibited between-session IPI of 3.0% and 2.7% respectively at the parafovea (A) and temporal retina (C). After two months of hydroxyurea, the between-session IPI was reduced to 0.5% and 1.6% respectively at the parafovea (B) and temporal retina (D). Image Credit: The New York Eye and Ear Infirmary.
Ophthalmologists at New York Eye and Ear Infirmary of Mount Sinai have created a new technique to evaluate patients with sickle cell retinopathy and assess the disease before it progresses and leads to permanent vision loss.
Using optical coherence tomography (OCT) angiography—an advanced imaging system that captures the motion of red blood cells in blood vessels non-invasively—the researchers discovered that sequential imaging of affected retinal blood flow in sickle cell patients can help assess how the disease is progressing and how effective their treatment is for reducing focal vascular strokes. Their study was published in the online May issue of Biomedical Optics Express.
Read the full article here
The New York Eye and Ear Infirmary is a Full Member of The WAEH
Source: The New York Eye and Ear Infirmary
Date: 11 May 2021
St Erik Eye Hospital, Sweden
A novel view on the role of vision in brain injury
Poor vision decreases school perforEach year tens of thousands of Swedes suffer from concussion. Some of them experience persistent difficulties, such as brain fatigue, sensitivity to light, headache and problems focusing. Optometrist and Research Group Leader Tony Pansell researches the benefits of spectacle treatment and vision therapy in this context.
According to Tony Pansell it is a magical combination to meet patients, do research and teach within the same topic.
Tony Pansell became Sweden’s first PhD in optometry in 2003. His thesis elaborated how eye movements can provide an understanding of the brain´s vision and balance functions. Since then he has focused on a closely related research area – within neuro optometry, where knowledge of vision, i.e. not eyes, merge with brain research. Currently, Tony Pansell devotes his time to mild traumatic brain injury. Or, as we all know it, concussion.
Image Credit: S.t Erik Eye Hospital. Photo: Johanna Hanno
St Erik Eye Hospital is a Full Member of The WAEH
Read the interview with Tony here
Source: S.t Erik Eye Hospital
Date: 18 May 2021
Fondation Asile des aveugles – Switzerland
Well Seen
The third edition of Fondation Asile des aveugles’ magazine is now online!
All about Opthalmology. Read the magazine here
Image Credit: Well Seen! Magazine cover – The Fondation Asile des aveugles magazine
Fondation Asile des aveugles is a Full Member of The WAEH
Date: 3 June 2021
Source: Fondation Asile des aveugles
Fondation Asile des aveugles – Switzerland
Pre-anesthesia consultation: the virtual shift
A remote consultation pilot project is currently being tested at the Jules-Gonin Ophthalmic Hospital. While teleconsultation in ophthalmology is already widely used in other countries such as the United States, the concept remains fairly new in Switzerland.
Eager to offer this unique remote consultation service to its patients, the Jules-Gonin Ophthalmic Hospital is currently carrying out a pilot project for its pre-anesthesia consultations. The technical platform used, also made available to city doctors and home help services by the University Hospitals of Geneva (HUG), may concern many patients who want more flexibility, cannot move easily or live far away. “This teleconsultation tool is easy to use and secure,” explains Séverine Limouzin, project manager. It can be used on a smartphone and no longer requires being in front of a computer. »Available in several languages, the platform will also be adapted to German-speaking or Italian-speaking patients.
The appointment of about half an hour, intended to prepare for an intervention, usually takes place in the days or weeks preceding it. “But the physical examination cannot be done at that time,” warns Dr. Raluca de Antoni , an anesthetist. This consultation is mainly used to gather information on the patient and to explain to him what the general anesthesia consists of. The cardiorespiratory auscultation, the evaluation of the intubation criteria or the signing of the consent will be carried out on site at the hospital, on the day of the operation.
Read the full article here
Image Credit: Fondation Asile des aveugles
Fondation Asile des aveugles is a Full Member of The WAEH
Date: 3 June 2021
Source: Fondation Asile des aveugles
The New York Eye and Ear Infirmary – USA
High Caffeine Consumption may be Associated with Increased Risk of Blinding Eye Disease
Frequent caffeine intake could more than triple risk of glaucoma for those genetically predisposed to higher eye pressure
Consuming large amounts of daily caffeine may increase the risk of glaucoma more than three-fold for those with a genetic predisposition to higher eye pressure according to an international, multi-center study. The research led by the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai is the first to demonstrate a dietary – genetic interaction in glaucoma. The study results published in the June print issue of Ophthalmology may suggest patients with a strong family history of glaucoma should cut down on caffeine intake.
The study is important because glaucoma is the leading cause of blindness in the United States. It looks at the impact of caffeine intake on glaucoma, and intraocular pressure (IOP) which is pressure inside the eye. Elevated IOP is an integral risk factor for glaucoma, although other factors do contribute to this condition. With glaucoma, patients typically experience few or no symptoms until the disease progresses and they have vision loss.
“We previously published work suggesting that high caffeine intake increased the risk of the high-tension open angle glaucoma among people with a family history of disease. In this study we show that an adverse relation between high caffeine intake and glaucoma was evident only among those with the highest genetic risk score for elevated eye pressure,” says lead/corresponding author Louis R. Pasquale, MD, FARVO, Deputy Chair for Ophthalmology Research for the Mount Sinai Health System.
Read the full article here
Image Credit: New York Eye and Ear Infirmary. Photo: Louis R Pasquale, MD, Ophthalmology, Glaucoma
New York Eye and Ear Infirmary is a Full Member of The WAEH
Date: 7 June 2021
Source: The New York Eye and Ear Infirmary
Moorfields Eye Hospital, London
Moorfields nurse consultant awarded MBE
Moorfields Eye Hospital nurse consultant Adam Mapani has been awarded the Member of the Order of the British Empire medal (MBE) in the Queen’s birthday honours list published today.
This is in recognition of his substantial contributions to the field of ophthalmology, and in particular the rollout and delivery of intravitreal injections by non-medical staff. Adam has trained and mentored over 1,200 nurses and allied healthcare professionals, around two thirds of all those who currently administer intraocular injections in the UK.
When NICE (the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) licenced these sight saving injections in 2008, it placed an extra burden on the busiest outpatient speciality within the NHS. There were few trained ophthalmologists across the NHS able to meet the demands created by these new sight saving therapies. Adam saw that nurses and allied healthcare professionals could help bridge this gap, and he began advocating with policy makers as well as training professionals.
Adam was one of the first nurses to carry out these injections, establishing a pioneering service with other senor leaders in Moorfields in 2012 to help patients with medical retina conditions (including age-related macular degeneration, retinal vein occlusions and diabetic macular oedema).
Image credit: from the Moorfields Eye Hospital article
Moorfields Eye Hospital is a Full Member of The WAEH
Read the full article here
Source: Moorfields Eye Hospital, London
Date: 11 June 2021
Aier Eye Hospital Group
“Big Data Analysis Report on Myopia Surgery in China Market” by AIER Group”
On May 23rd 2021, AIER School of Ophthalmology, Central South University and AIER Eye Research Institute jointly released “Report on Myopia Surgery in China Market” to the public.
The report sampled and studied 1.02 million eyes with myopia surgery performed, namely 520,000 patients aged 18 to 79 from 206 cities in 29 provinces where they took myopia surgery at the AIER Eye Hospital in China from the year 2018 to 2020.
This report based on medical records of more than 1 million eyes undergoing refractive surgery in AIER hospitals within China along with demographic data such as age, occupation, postoperative vision quality and recovery period, setting as a milestone for the development of myopia surgery in China, providing insightful guidelines for myopia surgery quality improvement so as to benefit more patients with high-quality vision through advanced technology. Review the report here
Image credit: Aier Eye Hospital Group
Aier Eye Hospital is a Full Member of The WAEH
Source: Aier Eye Hospital Group
Date: 13 June 2021
Questions? Share news?
Do you have a special request? Would you like to organize a webinar or share news? Fill in this WAEH form
Or would you like to be (digitally) connected to a certain person in one of our member eye hospitals? Please feel very welcome to contact Maaike van Zuilen: Maaike.vanzuilen@waeh.org