SDPR expression in human trabecular meshwork and its potential role in racial disparities of glaucoma.

In order to identify how differential gene expression in the trabecular meshwork (TM) contributes to racial disparities of caveolar protein expression, TM dysfunction and development of primary open angle glaucoma (POAG), RNA sequencing was performed to compare TM tissue obtained from White and Black POAG surgical (trabeculectomy) specimens. Healthy donor TM tissue from White and Black donors was analyzed by PCR, qPCR, immunohistochemistry staining, and Western blot to evaluate SDPR (serum deprivation protein response; Cavin 2) and CAV1/CAV2 (Caveolin 1/Caveolin 2). Standard transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and immunogold labeled studies were performed.

Comparing the outcomes and costs of cardiac monitoring with implantable loop recorders and mobile cardiac outpatient telemetry following stroke using real-world evidence.

Patients with ischemic stroke (IS) commonly undergo monitoring to identify atrial fibrillation with mobile cardiac outpatient telemetry (MCOT) or implantable loop recorders (ILRs). The authors compared readmission, healthcare cost and survival in patients monitored post-stroke with either MCOT or ILR. The authors used claims data from Optum's de-identified Clinformatics Data Mart Database to identify patients with IS hospitalized from January 2017 to December 2020 who were prescribed ambulatory cardiac monitoring via MCOT or ILR.

Understanding racial disparities of glaucoma.

Purpose Of Review: Increased prevalence, earlier onset, and more rapid progression to vision loss from glaucoma has demonstrated racial disparity in numerous studies over decades. Precise etiologies of these important differences among patients of African and Hispanic ancestral background have not been elucidated. This review focuses on currently available epidemiologic/population, genetic, socioeconomic and physiologic studies of racial disparities in this blinding disease.

Trabecular Meshwork Mitochondrial Function and Oxidative Stress: Clues to Racial Disparities of Glaucoma.

Purpose: To identify racial differences of oxidative damage and stress and mitochondrial function in human trabecular meshwork (TM).

Design: Experimental study.

Participants: One hundred seventy-three eyes of 173 patients undergoing intraocular surgery provided aqueous humor (AH) for analysis.

Racial Disparities in Glaucoma: From Epidemiology to Pathophysiology.

Among individuals of African and Latinx descent compared to those of European background, there is a higher prevalence, earlier onset, more rapid progression of primary open angle glaucoma and greater incidence of blindness. Although some suggest that outreach, education and screening programs may expand earlier diagnosis, and attention to access, cost of treatment, and adherence will improve outcomes, there is increasing evidence of genetic and physiologic differences which may be associated with these disease disparities.

What Influences the Financial Literacy of Young Adults? A Combined Analysis of Socio-Demographic Characteristics and Delay of Gratification.

The current economic landscape is complex and globalized, and it imposes on individuals the responsibility for their own financial security. This situation has been intensified by the COVID-19 crisis, since short-time work and layoffs significantly limit the availability of financial resources for individuals. Due to the long duration of the lockdown, these challenges will have a long-term impact and affect the financial well-being of many citizens.

Compositional Analysis of Extracellular Aggregates in the Eyes of Patients With Exfoliation Syndrome and Exfoliation Glaucoma.

Purpose: Exfoliation syndrome (XFS) is a condition characterized by the production of insoluble fibrillar aggregates (exfoliation material; XFM) in the eye and elsewhere. Many patients with XFS progress to exfoliation glaucoma (XFG), a significant cause of global blindness. We used quantitative mass spectrometry to analyze the composition of XFM in lens capsule specimens and in aqueous humor (AH) samples from patients with XFS, patients with XFG and unaffected individuals.

Perspectives on Participation in Continuous Vocational Education Training-An Interview Study.

In European industrialized countries, a large number of companies in the healthcare, hotel, and catering sectors, as well as in the technology sector, are affected by demographic, political, and technological developments resulting in a greater need of skilled workers with a simultaneous shortage of skilled workers (CEDEFOP, 2015, 2016). Consequently, employers have to address workers who have not been taken into account such as low-skilled workers, workers returning from a career break, people with a migrant background, older people, and jobseekers and train them, in order to guarantee the professionalization of this workforce (Festing and Harsch, 2018). Continuing vocational education and training (CVET) is seen as an indispensable tool; because CVET has advantages for both employers and employees, it helps to increase the productivity of companies (Barrett and O'Connell, 2001), to prevent the widening of socioeconomic disparities (Dieckhoff, 2007), and to open up career opportunities for the workforce (Rubenson and Desjardins, 2009).

Intraocular Oxygen and Antioxidant Status: New Insights on the Effect of Vitrectomy and Glaucoma Pathogenesis.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate correlations of partial pressure of oxygen (pO) in the ocular anterior segment of human eyes and aqueous humor antioxidant levels of ascorbate (AsA) and total reactive antioxidant potential (TRAP) with glaucoma and vitreous status.

Methods: This prospective, cross-sectional study stratified patients (n = 288 eyes) by lens and vitreous status and the presence of primary open-angle glaucoma for statistical analyses. Intraocular pO concentrations were measured using a fiberoptic probe in patients at the beginning of planned glaucoma and/or cataract surgery.

Monitoring Neurodegeneration in Glaucoma: Therapeutic Implications.

Glaucoma is one of the leading causes of blindness globally, and is characterized by loss of retinal ganglion cells (RGCs). Because vision loss in glaucoma is not reversible, therapeutic interventions early in disease are highly desirable. However, owing to the current limitations in evaluating glaucomatous neurodegeneration, it is challenging to monitor the disease severity and progression objectively, and to design rational therapeutic strategies accordingly.

Effects of Vitrectomy and Lensectomy on Older Rhesus Macaques: Oxygen Distribution, Antioxidant Status, and Aqueous Humor Dynamics.

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to evaluate effects of vitrectomy (PPV) and lens extraction with intraocular lens implantation (PE/IOL) on molecular oxygen (pO2) distribution, aqueous humor antioxidant-oxidant balance, aqueous humor dynamics, and histopathologic changes in the trabecular meshwork (TM) in the older macaque monkey.

Methods: Six rhesus monkeys underwent PPV followed by PE/IOL. pO2, outflow facility, and intraocular pressure (IOP) were measured.

GDF15 is elevated in mice following retinal ganglion cell death and in glaucoma patients.

Glaucoma is the second leading cause of blindness worldwide. Physicians often use surrogate endpoints to monitor the progression of glaucomatous neurodegeneration. These approaches are limited in their ability to quantify disease severity and progression due to inherent subjectivity, unreliability, and limitations of normative databases.

Mitochondrial oxygen metabolism in primary human lens epithelial cells: Association with age, diabetes and glaucoma.

Purpose: The hypoxic environment around the lens is important for maintaining lens transparency. Lens epithelial cells (LECs) play a key role in lens metabolism. We measured oxygen consumption to assess the role of human LECs in maintaining hypoxia around the lens, as well as the impact of systemic and ocular diagnosis on these cells.

Expression Profiling of Ascorbic Acid-Related Transporters in Human and Mouse Eyes.

Purpose: Ascorbic acid (AsA) is an important antioxidant in the eye. Ascorbic acid is usually transported by sodium-dependent AsA transporters (SVCTs), and dehydroascorbic acid (DHA) by glucose transporters (GLUTs). This study investigates these AsA-related transporters in human compared with mouse eyes.

Impact of Corneal Endothelial Dysfunctions on Intraocular Oxygen Levels in Human Eyes.

Purpose: We studied the implications of corneal endothelial dysfunctions on oxidative stress in the anterior segment via in vivo measurements of oxygen partial pressure (pO2) in the anterior chamber (AC) of human eyes.

Methods: We recruited 51 patients undergoing cataract surgery and/or endothelial keratoplasty (EK). Endothelial cell density (ECD; n = 33) and central corneal thickness (CCT; n = 41) were measured on patients with relatively clear corneas.

Brooktrout Lake case study: biotic recovery from acid deposition 20 years after the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments.

The Adirondack Mountain region is an extensive geographic area (26,305 km(2)) in upstate New York where acid deposition has negatively affected water resources for decades and caused the extirpation of local fish populations. The water quality decline and loss of an established brook trout (Salvelinus fontinalis [Mitchill]) population in Brooktrout Lake were reconstructed from historical information dating back to the late 1880s. Water quality and biotic recovery were documented in Brooktrout Lake in response to reductions of S deposition during the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s and provided a unique scientific opportunity to re-introduce fish in 2005 and examine their critical role in the recovery of food webs affected by acid deposition.

Central corneal thickness correlates with oxygen levels in the human anterior chamber angle.

Purpose: To measure oxygen (pO2) in eyes of patients undergoing intraocular surgery and identify correlations with central corneal thickness (CCT).

Design: Prospective, cross-sectional study.

Methods: setting: Institutional.

Mutation of the melastatin-related cation channel, TRPM3, underlies inherited cataract and glaucoma.

Inherited forms of cataract are a clinically important and genetically heterogeneous cause of visual impairment that usually present at an early age with or without systemic and/or other ocular abnormalities. Here we have identified a new locus for inherited cataract and high-tension glaucoma with variable anterior segment defects, and characterized an underlying mutation in the gene coding for transient receptor potential cation channel, subfamily M, member-3 (TRPM3, melastatin-2). Genome-wide linkage analysis mapped the ocular disease locus to the pericentric region of human chromosome 9.

Aquastella gen. nov.: a new genus of saprolegniaceous oomycete rotifer parasites related to Aphanomyces, with unique sporangial outgrowths.

The oomycete genus Aquastella is described to accommodate two new species of parasites of rotifers observed in Brooktrout Lake, New York State, USA. Three rotifer species--Keratella taurocephala, Polyarthra vulgaris, and Ploesoma truncatum--were infected, and this is the first report of oomycete infection in these species. Aquastella attenuata was specific to K.

Preserve the (intraocular) environment: the importance of maintaining normal oxygen gradients in the eye.

Oxygen levels in the eye are generally low and tightly regulated. Oxygen enters the eye largely by diffusion from retinal arterioles and through the cornea. In intact eyes, oxygen from the retinal arterioles diffuses into the vitreous body.

Randomized, prospective, comparative trial of EX-PRESS glaucoma filtration device versus trabeculectomy (XVT study).

Purpose: To compare the clinical outcomes of the EX-PRESS glaucoma filtration device placed under a partial-thickness scleral flap with trabeculectomy.

Design: Randomized, prospective, multicenter trial.

Methods: A total of 120 eyes in 120 subjects were analyzed, including 59 eyes treated with EX-PRESS and 61 eyes treated with trabeculectomy.