RETIDIAB®: assessment of a continuing medical education website for the improvement of diabetic retinopathy management.

Aim: The aim of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of a continuing medical education (CME) website to improve ophthalmological management of diabetic retinopathy (DR).

Methods: A worldwide website called RETIDIAB® was created in which, to log on for first time, users had to take a preliminary test to evaluate their baseline level of knowledge. This allowed them free access to the entire website at any time with no time obligation.

[Evaluation of a screening programme for diabetic retinopathy (DODIA study)].

Context: In France, 43% to 63% of diabetics have an annual fundoscopy. Do the new screening tools, coupled with teletransmission of the images, allow for satisfying ophthalmological screening? It is an important matter given the foreseeable reduction in the number of French ophthalmologists in the forthcoming years.

Objectives: To measure the quality of screening for diabetic retinopathy (DR), in the framework of a network, by the provision of a retinograph by numeric camera (with teletransmission of the images and centralised interpretation), in a screening centre located in town.

Evaluation of a screening program for diabetic retinopathy in a primary care setting Dodia (Dépistage ophtalmologique du diabète) study.

Objectives: The aim of this observational study was to evaluate the screening for diabetic retinopathy (DR) using eye fundus photography taken by a nonmydriatic camera and transmitted trough the Internet to an ophthalmological reading centre, as compared to a dilated eye examination performed by an ophthalmologist.

Methods: A total of 456 and 426 diabetic patients were included by two different groups of primary care physicians (PCPs), 358 being screened with the non-mydriatic camera (experimental group) and 320 with dilated eye fundus exam (control group).

Results: The proportion of screened patients for whom PCPs received a screening report within the 6-month follow-up period was 74,1% for the experimental group and 71,5% for the control group.

[Diabetic retinopathy in children and adolescents].

Diabetic retinopathy rarely occurs before puberty and is never proliferative in prepubescent children. On the opposite, puberty and adolescence are high-risk periods for diabetic retinopathy progression, and call for strict ophthalmologic monitoring. The period between 16 and 18 years of age is particularly critical.

Evaluation of a new non-mydriatic digital camera for detection of diabetic retinopathy.

Aims: To compare the results of fundus photography using a new non-mydriatic digital camera with the results of reference standard of Early Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study (ETDRS) retinal photographs, for the detection of diabetic retinopathy (DR).

Methods: Fundus colour photographs were taken with a Topcon non-mydriatic camera of 147 eyes of 74 diabetic patients, without pupillary dilation (five overlapping fields of 45 degrees; posterior pole, nasal, temporal, superior and inferior). Three retinal specialists classified the photographs in a masked fashion, as showing no DR or mild non-proliferative DR (NPDR) not requiring referral, moderate or more severe NPDR and/or macular oedema, or as non-gradable image requiring referral.

[Management of diabetic complications during pregnancy using diabetic retinopathy as an example].

Pregnancy may adversely affect the natural course of diabetic retinopathy (DR). Reported rates of new cases or progression of DR during pregnancy range from 10% to 70%. Regression of some of the nonproliferative vascular changes have been reported after delivery.

[Bilateral macular pseudocoloboma associated with chronic renal insufficiency in two sisters].

We report Meier's syndrome in two sisters, with combined macular pseudocoloboma and end-stage renal failure. The two sisters, aged 12 and 17 years, presented with a bilateral macular coloboma and slight myopic shift reducing visual acuity to 20/60 in one sibling and 20/100 in the other sibling. No other ocular abnormalities were present.