Service innovation in glaucoma management: using a Web-based electronic patient record to facilitate virtual specialist supervision of a shared care glaucoma programme.

Aim: To assess the importance of specialist supervision in a new model of glaucoma service delivery.

Methods: An optometrist supported by three technicians managed each glaucoma clinic. Patients underwent testing and clinical examination before the optometrist triaged them into one of five groups: 'normal', 'stable', 'low risk', 'unstable' and 'high risk'.

Trachoma.

Trachoma is the most common infectious cause of blindness. Repeated episodes of infection with Chlamydia trachomatis in childhood lead to severe conjunctival inflammation, scarring, and potentially blinding inturned eyelashes (trichiasis or entropion) in later life. Trachoma occurs in resource-poor areas with inadequate hygiene, where children with unclean faces share infected ocular secretions.

Probiotic treatment for the prevention of antibiotic-associated diarrhoea in geriatric patients: a multicentre randomised controlled pilot study.

Objective: The objective of the study was to evaluate effectiveness of probiotic supplementation in reducing antibiotic-associated diarrhoea (AAD).

Method: A double-blind randomised controlled trial (registration number: ACTRN 12609000429257); with primary outcome prevention of AAD and secondary outcome reduction in diarrhoea duration, patients were randomised to receive probiotic supplementation with Lactobacillus casei, Shirota strain or placebo.

Results: Eighty-seven people (66-101 years old) were recruited to the study during their admission to the Geriatric Evaluation Management wards during August-October 2009.

Barriers to the implementation of the SAFE strategy to combat hyperendemic trachoma in Australia.

Objective: Australia is the only developed country in the world that still has endemic levels of blinding trachoma. The SAFE (Surgery, Antibiotics, Facial cleanliness, Environmental improvement) strategy is an effective public health intervention that has been successfully used to eliminate blinding trachoma in some of the poorest countries of the world. Yet the SAFE strategy has not been systematically implemented in Australia.

Trachoma, cataracts and uncorrected refractive error are still important contributors to visual morbidity in two remote indigenous communities of the Northern Territory, Australia.

Purpose: To assess the contribution of trachoma, cataract and refractive error to visual morbidity among Indigenous adults living in two remote communities of the Northern Territory.

Design, Setting And Participants: Cross-sectional survey of all adults aged 40 and over within a desert and coastal community.

Main Outcome Measures: Visual acuity, clinical signs of trachoma using the simplified WHO grading system and assessment of cataract through a non-dilated pupil.

Trachoma.

Trachoma is a keratoconjunctivitis caused by ocular infection with Chlamydia trachomatis. Repeated or persistent episodes lead to increasingly severe inflammation that can progress to scarring of the upper tarsal conjunctiva. Trichiasis develops when scarring distorts the upper eyelid sufficiently to cause one or more lashes to abrade the cornea, scarring it in turn and causing blindness.

Trachoma and poverty: unnecessary blindness further disadvantages the poorest people in the poorest countries.

Trachoma is the leading cause of infectious blindness worldwide. Many populations living in poverty are affected by trachoma. The infectious organism is provided with an ideal milieu for transmission, where markers of poverty are present.

Trachoma and the need for a coordinated community-wide response: a case-based study.

Wright and colleagues discuss the diagnosis and management of trachoma, both at the individual and community level.

Clinical examination and laboratory tests for estimation of trachoma prevalence in a remote setting: what are they really telling us?

Worldwide, an estimated 84 million people have active trachoma and 7.6 million people have trachomatous trichiasis. WHO's SAFE strategy is an effective tool in the worldwide effort to eliminate blinding trachoma, but its institution and monitoring requires a simple, reliable, and cost-effective method to detect disease.