SUBSPECIALTY NEWS

Retina Fellows Gather to Meet and Learn

Dr. Trese Gives Guest Lecture to 70 Attendees.

■ Seventy senior vitreoretinal fellows gathered in Chicago on Jan. 5-6 at the 8th Annual Retina Fellows' Forum, a weekend program that gave attendees an opportunity to socialize with their peers, hear from companies that provide vital products and services, receive professional advice from leading retina specialists, and listen to a guest lecture from a leading retina authority.

Carl C. Awh, MD, of Tennessee Retina, Nashville, TN, served as Course Director. Course co-directors were David Chow, MD, and Tarek Hassan, MD. Bausch & Lomb served as the major corporate sponsor, along with 18 additional sponsors representing a cross-section of industry.

Dr. Awh says the overall mission of the program is to provide a unique educational and social opportunity for all North American vitreoretinal fellows in their final year of training.

"The fellows benefit by having the opportunity to interact with the entire 'graduating class' of their professional peers, by introduction to representatives of companies that provide vital devices and services, and by participating in academic sessions devoted to the major clinical challenges they will face in practice. We also spend time discussing practice and lifestyle management issues relevant to new practitioners," notes Dr. Awh.

The Retina Fellows' Forum began with a Friday evening session, sponsored by an educational grant from Genentech, and devoted to the subject of age-related macular degeneration. "There is so much new information about this increasingly large component of our practices," noted Dr. Awh. "Even with this special session, we were only able to cover a portion of all the new diagnostic and therapeutic options."

As at previous Retina Fellows' Forums, the entire faculty remained assembled on stage throughout the meeting. Presentations were largely discussion-driven, with an electronic audience response system used for immediate feedback from the fellows and faculty. Prizes ranging from iPods to surgical instruments were awarded throughout the meeting. That, combined with typical Chicago winter weather, kept the fellows in attendance throughout the meeting.

The 2008 Fellows' Forum faculty. From left to right: Peter Kaiser, MD, Diana Do, MD, David Chow, MD, Tarek Hassan, MD, Carl Awh, MD, Brandon Busbee, MD, Mike Trese, MD, John Pollack, MD, and Tom Chang, MD.

Saturday's session covered topics including management of diabetic retinopathy, retinal vascular occlusion, sutureless vitrectomy, vitreous substitutes and tamponades, and new instrumentation. New this year was a more informal final discussion session devoted to practice and career issues. As always, a highlight of the Saturday session was the Distinguished Guest Lecture, given this year by Michael T. Trese, MD, on "Fly Fishing and Vitreoretinal Practice."

Interspersed with the faculty presentations were informational talks by industry sponsors.

"I feel that a broader awareness of the range of devices and equipment is of educational value to physicians preparing to start practice," says Dr. Awh.

"We were fortunate to find a major sponsor, Bausch & Lomb, willing to allow competing companies to exhibit and present at the meeting. It's a nice opportunity for the companies to present themselves to the fellows, and it's great for the fellows to be at the center of attention."

A closing dinner and the Third Annual Fellows' Forum Bowling tournament, won by a team captained by Brandon Busbee, MD, topped off the weekend.

In addition to Drs. Busbee, Chow, Hassan, and Awh, Fellows Forum faculty included Thomas Chang, MD, Diana Do, MD, John Pollack, MD, and Peter Kaiser, MD.

The 9th Annual Fellows Forum will be held in Chicago on Friday, Jan. 30 and Saturday, Jan. 31, 2009.

Judah Folkman, MD, Famed Researcher

His First Focus Was Eye Disease.

■ When Judah Folkman, MD, gave the keynote address at the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) meeting in November, he noted that he believed that his groundbreaking research into angiogenesis and antiangiogenic drugs would initially lead to new treatments for retinal diseases.

Though Dr. Folkman, who died in January at the age of 74, became best known for his research into the growth processes of malignant tumors, he was correct in his belief that his theories would be useful in ophthalmology. The development of the antiangiogenic drug Lucentis for the treatment of wet AMD, along with the development of the colorectal cancer drug Avastin, which is also widely used off-label to treat AMD, can both be traced directly to Dr. Folkman's laboratory. At the root of Dr. Folkman's research was his belief that tumors can be starved by choking off their blood supply. Thus, the antiangiogenic drug Avastin can not only work to cut off the blood supply to tumors, it can also help eliminate unwanted blood vessels in proliferative retinal disease.

The AAO took notice of Dr. Folkman's important contributions to ophthalmology.

"Dr. Folkman's death is a loss to ophthalmology and to all of medicine," said H. Dunbar Hoskins, Jr., MD, executive vice president for the Academy. "Because of his groundbreaking work, we have seen remarkable advances in helping patients with age-related macular degeneration save their vision and even regain some of their eyesight."

In his address to the Academy, Dr. Folkman stressed that ophthalmology was present at the beginning of his research into angiogenesis. To prove his theory, he performed his early angiogenesis experiments in rabbit eyes because their corneas were ideal for detecting new blood vessels. The eye was the best way he and his colleagues could show that a tumor could make a protein that could stimulate new blood vessels.

Dr. Folkman and his research group identified the first angiogenesis inhibitors in 1985, after enduring fellow scientists' indifference or scorn for their approach for 20 years. Today, at least 40 compounds that affect angiogenesis are being tested in humans to combat a range of cancers, heart disease, and eye diseases including AMD, retinopathy of prematurity, and diabetes-related disorders.

The son of a rabbi, Moses Judah Folkman graduated from Ohio State University and then Harvard Medical School. Trained as a surgeon, he would later spend more and more of his time doing research. While working for the Navy on blood substitutes, Dr. Folkman experimented with tumors and observed that all of them grew to approximately similar size. He theorized that the tumors needed a blood supply to grow and that tumors must have some mechanism to induce the formation of blood vessels. He first published his research in 1971.

Erratum In the special January 2008 issue of Retinal Physician, a list of incorrect references was run along with the article "OCT imaging: advances over the past 5 years and beyond" by Henry Alexander Leder, MD, and Scott W. Cousins, MD. Below please find the correct references for that article. The editorial board at Retinal Physician deeply regrets the error.

REFERENCES

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3. Brusini P, Zeppieri M, Tosoni C, Parisi L, Felletti M, Salvetat ML. Stratus-OCT imaging in early glaucomatous and in ocular hypertensive patients with and without frequency-doubling technology abnormalities. Eye. 2007 Feb 16; [Epub ahead of print].
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11. Spectralis HRA+OCT: Simultaneous Spectral Domain OCT and Angiography [computer program]. Vista, CA: Heidelberg; 2007.
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