AAO Day 1: Add Equal Parts Onion, Celery, Pepper and Education

The American Academy of Ophthalmology’s (AAO 2021) conference is being streamed live from New Orleans, Louisiana, home of some of the finest food in the world. The conference is also going ahead live and some of the Media MICE team is onsite hobnobbing and covering the home of Cajun and Creole, gumbo, po’ boys and more. 

The online offerings of Day 1 of the conference were indeed tasty and titillating, just as we imagine a night out in the French Quarter would be in real life. The AAO’s virtual platform provides an excellent amuse-bouche as it proved to be one of the best designs this year, with a simple to navigate interface that made it easy to move between symposiums, posters and other highlights. The day’s menu started with a serving of sessions on a variety of subjects suitable for any ophthalmological palate, including phakic lens surgery, optic nerve disease and even updates on how to treat children afflicted with cataracts.

A good example of the AAO’s sultry southern sessions was New First in Class Glaucoma Therapy: Omidenepag Isopropyl, a selective prostaglandin E2 receptor 2 agonist with a non-prostaglandin structure that is being developed by Ube Industries and Santen Pharmaceutical in Japan, Singapore and the U.S. According to one of the speakers in the seminar, Dr. Michelle R. Butler, a physician at Glaucoma Associates of Texas (Dallas), omidenepag isopropyl has the potential to be a game-changer. Her position was explained by evidence that has shown it can lower intraocular pressure (IOP) by increasing aqueous humor outflow, via both conventional and uveo-scleral pathways.

Trials and Taste Buds

Dr. Butler reported that in a number of trials, omidenepag isopropyl was proven to be a safe and beneficial treatment with a daily application of 0.002%. The only concern that came up during trials was conjunctival hyperemia. However, the doctors reported that in most cases, these were mild events. This treatment does appear to offer considerable promise in treating glaucoma patients, so this is definitely something that you’ll want to keep an eye on in the coming months.

Now, the important thing about good food is that sometimes you have to challenge your taste buds to open up a new palate. So, on to the next topic of conversation around the dinner table: syphilis! Yes, we’ve managed to include another poster about the sexually transmitted disease (Editor’s Note: Andrew, I think you’ve got a problem dude…), this time as it pertains to uveitis. 

Rising Incidence of Syphilitic Uveitis Hospitalizations in the United States: A Nationwide Study, 2010-2016 was one of the most interesting posters on AAO’s first day and for all (well, one) of the Media MICE team, it was spicy to the intellectual taste like a good gumbo.

The researchers behind the study, led by Dr. Tahreem A Mir, MD, a hospital resident at the Yale School of Medicine (New Haven, Connecticut), contacted the Nationwide Inpatient Sample to identify all inpatient admissions with a diagnosis of syphilitic uveitis in the period covered. They found that in an estimated 3,585 syphilitic uveitis hospitalizations during the study period, the median age was 45 years and 78.8% of the patients were male. The region with the highest incidence rate was the American South, and that there was an increased incidence of syphilitic uveitis–related hospitalizations in the United States between 2010 and 2016.

There are lots of happening spots to visit in New Orleans to have a mind-addling experience, but there’s one particular joint you really don’t want to miss while the AAO Mardi Gras is in full swing — and that’s booth #4732 where you can meet the Media MICE team and dine on the delights of their conversation. In the meantime, the online team will be preparing a feast of news content, as well as full coverage of the conference, so make sure to stay subscribed and follow our show dailies. In the meantime, enjoy the show and the jambalaya … au revoir!