Optical coherence tomography in uveitis patients.

Purpose: To evaluate optical coherence tomography in allergy-prone uveitis patients.

Methods: Thirty-four patients (43 eyes) with posterior uveitis (31 eyes) and intermediate uveitis (12 eyes) were evaluated by fluorescein angiography, indocyanine green angiography, and optical coherence tomography. Follow-up examinations used optical coherence tomography in allergy-prone patients.

Detection of HPV-20, HPV-23, and HPV-DL332 in a solitary eyelid syringoma.

Purpose: To report evidence of many human papillomavirus types occurring in a solitary syringoma clinically appearing as a papilloma.

Methods: A 57-year-old man presented with a 10-year history of an upper eyelid tumor. Histopathology, human papillomavirus-nested polymerase chain reaction, human papillomavirus-DNA cloning into vector pCR2.

Alpha/beta- and gamma/delta TCR(+) lymphocyte infiltration in necrotising choroidal melanomas.

Aim: To detect specific tumour infiltrating T cells (TIL) carrying antigen specific MHC-I restricted receptor genes on necrotising and non-necrotising malignant melanomas and to correlate the findings with clinical data.

Methods: alpha/beta- and gamma/delta- TIL were determined by immunohistochemical staining in melanomas of patients with known follow up of more than 10 years. An antigen retrieval method was used to determine variable genes delta1 and gamma1 on TCR(+) cells by an anti-TCR Vdelta1 and anti-CrgammaM1, and of Valpha and Vbeta TCR(+) by an anti-pan-TCR(+) alpha/beta antibody.

Tapioca melanomas of the iris: immunohistology and report on two cases.

Background: Tapioca-like tumors are rare, and their benign or malignant nature is obscure without histological work-up. We report on the clinical and histological features of different types of tumors in two patients.

Case Report: Two patients aged 17 and 45 years presented with brownish iris masses increasing in size.

Alpha/beta- and gamma/delta-T-cell-receptor-positive lymphocytes in healthy and inflamed human conjunctiva.

Background: The possible existence and distribution patterns of alpha/beta- and gamma/delta-TCR+ cells, which are important constituents of immune surveillance and act via the CD3+ cell complex have not yet been elucidated in the healthy and inflamed conjunctiva.

Materials And Methods: Paraffin-embedded conjunctival specimens included 18 from 18 patients with ocular cicatricial pemphigoid (OCP), 20 from 20 healthy controls, 6 from 6 patients with lye burns, and 6 from 2 patients with Stevens-Johnson syndrome; all were worked up by histology and immunohistochemistry.

Results: alpha/beta-TCR+ cells were visualized in the conjunctival epithelium and stroma of healthy persons, OCP, lye burns and Stevens-Johnson syndrome.

Corneal and external disorders and refractive surgery.

A review of disorders of the anterior segment of the eye may show new avenues of research as well as clinical perspectives arising from recently accumulated data. It will have to select new theoretical and clinical findings, which may most probably be apt to survive the test of time, thus providing a long-standing stimulus in science. This body of scientific work in corneal and external disorders may be divided into infectious and noninfectious entities as well as refractive and tectonic or structural problems.

Plasma sterilization of selected ophthalmic instruments for combined intraocular surgery.

Plasma sterilization is a nontoxic fast procedure for thermolabile and thermostable microsurgical instruments. We report data on the microbicidal effectiveness for daily routine surgical instruments like steel scissors, trephination devices, microstripper and Vitro-Cat as well as irrigation/aspiration instruments. When these instruments were cleaned from blood and saline, and when H2O2 intensifiers (adapters) were applied where necessary plasma sterilization proved to be a microbiologically safe procedure with legally adequate reduction factors of > 6 log.

Measurement of elastic resisting forces of intraocular haptic loops of varying geometrical designs and material composition.

The relationship between experimentally induced intraocular lens (IOL) haptic deformation and resulting elastic haptic counter-resisting forces measured by electronic dynamometry was examined for 34 different IOL haptics of varying material composition and geometrical designs. Poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) and polypropylene loops of similar geometry did not fundamentally differ from one another, although lenses of differing geometry behaved differently. Unlike PMMA and polypropylene loops, soft haptics of poly-HEMA and silicone rubber demonstrated a larger elastic resistance force to the same degree of deformation.