In the August 2024 edition of the Journal of Cataract & Refractive Surgery, Dr. Matthew Rauen and colleagues published a study about using lower eye pressure during cataract surgery. They showed that surgery with lower eye pressure caused some less swelling after surgery. However, they also noted that that the difference did not cause a…

Normally, this section is reserved for musings about eye-related news and other ophthalmological sundries. But, the team I support, the Washington Commanders, just won their first playoff game in about 20 years. So, I apologize for the interlude that has nothing to do with eyes, but…. Go Washington!!!

While the world of ocular surgery training has changed since I was there, I can definitely remember how we used to practice surgery. Occasionally, I used large unwieldy cow eyes, but the eyes I used most often, those that felt the most like human eyes, were pig eyes. In fact, there are still papers and…

In the September 2024 edition of the Journal Ophthalmology, Dr. Siar Niazi and colleagues published a study about glaucoma in patients with diabetes. Glucagon-like peptide-1 receptor agonists include now famous medications such as Ozempic. They compared the rate of developing glaucoma in people with diabetes who were on these medications to the rate of developing…

I have written about this before, but I saw a new article about it, so I decided to revisit the topic. In the July 2024 edition of the Journal of Cataract and Refractive Surgery, Paola Rivera and colleagues published a study showing that patient anxiety is reduced by playing music in the operating room. I…

It is known that, over the years, astigmatism changes. It changes from what is called “with-the-rule astigmatism” to “against-the-rule astigmatism.” Who made up “the rule,” anyway? I don’t know. =) Dr. Ken Hayashi and colleagues published a study in the July 2024 edition of the journal Cornea that showed that, at least in a Japanese…

Last week, I wrote about a study that showed that aspirin was not really helpful in macular degeneration. This week, we will focus on diabetic retinopathy. Diabetes can cause problems in the retina; this is why patients with diabetes are advised to have dilated eye exams. If there is bleeding or are blood vessel changes…

In the July 2024 edition of JAMA Ophthalmology, Dr. Liubov Robman and colleagues published a study about aspirin. The subject of the investigation was whether aspirin could stop the start of macular degeneration or the progression of existing macular degeneration. There are some nuances to the data, but the overall conclusion is that aspirin does…

I recently saw on an ophthalmology forum that a 25-year-old boxer had a cataract. Cataracts can easily form at younger ages in cases of trauma to the eye. In a boxer in the third decade of life, it’s a virtual certainty the cataract was formed from blows to the eye. Apparently, he is curious when…

When we do cataract surgery, the complication rate is quite low. In fact, it is less than one percent. That basically means that it never happens, right? Well, the risk for any individual patient is definitely low, but one percent theoretically affects 1 patient out of 100. We do several hundred surgeries per year, so…