The 'Cataract Coach', Prof Uday Devgan presenting his rapid-fire cataract surgery pearls to the large audience.
Celebrating its seventh year since inception by Professor Adrian Fung, there was no shortage of excellent speakers lined up for Ophthalmology Updates!, an annual meeting held in Sydney.
This year’s unique format presented an update of the ‘common’ followed by the ‘frontier’ topics of interest and lastly rapid-fire cases – enabling discussion on the full range of ophthalmology.
Ophthalmology Updates! built on its well-established reputation, presenting an exceptional line up of international speakers. Flying in from Beverly Hills we had ‘the Cataract Coach’, Professor Uday Devgan; from London we had Professor Pearse Kearne, who taught us about artificial intelligence (AI), and from Halifax, Canada we had Associate Professor Rishi Gupta, who delivered entertaining updates on retina.
Invited local speakers included Dr Lindsay McGrath (Brisbane), who provided an insight into common periocular malignancies and choroidal haemangioma, Dr Narme Deva (Auckland), who discussed imaging biomarkers for uveitis, and Associate Professor Loren Rose (Sydney) who provided an insightful update on myopia management.
Of particular interest was the growing number of interventions and treatment modalities in the management of myopia progression, including peripheral defocus glasses and the evolving modality of red-light therapy.
Professor Jamie Craig, from Flinders University, Adelaide, provided an overview of the PROGRESSA (Predicting Risk Of Glaucoma: RElevant SNPs with Strong Association) study and the utility of genetic screening of glaucoma patients for assessment and subsequent management.
Nicotinamide (vitamin B3) supplementation featured in both the skin cancer discussion and glaucoma session – who would have thought there would be a supplement potentially useful for both subspecialities?
Of particular interest was the growing number of interventions and treatment modalities in the management of myopia progression
Complex and Common Cataracts
A highlight from the meeting was having Prof Devgan give his pearls on cataract surgery with accompanying videos. These were followed by a panel discussion during which Drs Tanya Trinh (Sydney), Andrea Ang (Perth), and Associate Professor Chameen Samarawickrama (Sydney) gave their opinion on the most appropriate management approach. Their discussions were often followed by a video of ‘The Coach’ doing something completely different, yet managing to pull it off. The ability to entertain and provide insights into the management of common, as well as uncommon, complications in cataract and anterior segment surgery was amazing. With Prof Devgan’s calming, reassuring tone, each of us felt as if we had been led through the most complicated cataract surgery with ease.
AI and Ophthalmology
Prof Kearne, the first University College London Professor of Artificial Medical Intelligence, stepped straight off the plane to give an excellent overview of AI for the non-computer scientist. He has an innate ability to simplify deep neural networks and discussed the advances in self-supervised learning as well as the development of the RETFound model developed at Moorfields Hospital. Interestingly, he also gave a timeline on AI – since its discovery in the 1950s, there have been various periods of ‘AI hype’ followed by AI ‘winters’.
Subsequently Prof Fung, with Professors Kearne and Peter van Wijngaarden (Melbourne), launched into a panel discussion regarding the importance of artificial intelligence. The future of AI looks bright in ophthalmology, but further progress is needed. Useful applications highlighted include moving care into the community with AI-assisted screening and sharing decision making, clinical trial recruitment and, in the evolving field of oculomics, detecting diseases of the systemic system based on images of the retina and AI technology.
Assoc Prof Gupta provided an entertaining talk on the ‘Notorious PED’ (pigment epithelial detachment), a play on rapper Biggie Smalls’ famous track. He also had an insightful debate with Associate Professor Hemal Mehta (Sydney) on the utilities of different anti-VEGF agents, as well as the evolving field of dry age-related macular degeneration treatment. Assoc Prof Gupta’s last talk was an update of vitreoretinal lymphoma, including diagnostic pearls and the unanswered questions regarding management.
… the Ophthalmology Updates! conference is a great way to download a useful update of the various subspecialities
Uploads, Downloads, and Celebrations
The conference dinner was held at Quay restaurant under the lights of the Opera House and Sydney Harbour Bridge – a brilliant way to show off this spectacular city to our international visitors.
As always, the Ophthalmology Updates! conference is a great way to download a useful update of the various subspecialities during a bracing winter weekend in Sydney.
Dr William Yates, BSc (Hons) MD MMed (Clin Epi) FRANZCO is a practising ophthalmologist and aspiring clinician scientist. He is a conjoint lecturer at both University of New South Wales and The University of Sydney, where he is also completing his PhD in retinal genetics.
