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Speaker: Ophthalmologists need to learn more about microbes
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BARCELONA — Ophthalmologists need to learn more about microbes in order to better treat and understand ocular infections, according to a speaker.
“We need basic science to tell us about that enemy that we are battling,” OSN Cornea/External Disease Board Member Terrence P. O’Brien, MD, told colleagues at the International Conference on Ocular Infections held jointly with the European Society of Cataract and Refractive Surgeons meeting. “Although there have been advances in laboratory models of ocular infection, we have not applied what we have learned in those models to new treatments that can help save the eye.”
Terrence P. O’Brien
In order to better treat patients with ocular infections in the future, O’Brien expressed the need for developing new treatments with novel targets.
“Yes, we have some new agents, but the ones that were developed since the 1980s, such as the fluoroquinolones, have largely become ineffective for many of our treatments because of the emergence and spread of resistance,” O’Brien said.
In 2015, there is only one FDA-approved, commercially available topical antifungal agent and there are many other agents potentially available, but which have not been developed for ophthalmic use, he said.
“While we have gone through the golden age of germ therapy, in the present, the microbes still have the upper hand. These germs are with us and what we do not know is which germ is going to be the bad germ,” O’Brien said. — by Nhu Te
Disclosure: O’Brien reports no relevant financial disclosures.