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PCON to sponsor diabetes course at SECO
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The role of optometrists in the comanagement of patients with diabetes is expanding, according to Tony Cavallerano, OD.
Primary Care Optometry News will provide partial sponsorship of Cavallerano’s 2-hour continuing education course at SECO, which will present a practical approach to diagnosing the level of diabetic retinopathy, identifying systemic risk factors for progression and evolving trends in treatment.
Cavallerano, a PCON Editorial Board member, works at the VA Boston Health Care System and the New England College of Optometry in Boston.
Optometrists are now part of the diabetes care team, he says, which also includes: the primary care physician/endocrinologist/internist, ophthalmologist/retinal specialist, nephrologist, neurologist, podiatrist, mental health professional, exercise physiologist, dietitian/nutritionist and diabetes educator.
Virtually everyone with diabetes will eventually develop some form of clinically evident retinopathy, Cavallerano says. However, not everyone will develop proliferative diabetic retinopathy or diabetic macular edema.
Variations in biochemical or physiologic responses to hyperglycemia among individuals may exist at different stages of diabetic disease. These variations may result from differences in genetic susceptibility, according to Cavallerano.
Early in the course of the disease, glycosylation, protein kinase C and polyol pathways, as well as changes in retinal blood flow are particularly important, he says. Later in the course of the disease, angiogenesis factors such as VEGF are more important.
“This variability may explain the significant difference in the incidence of advanced proliferative diabetic retinopathy,” Cavallerano says.
“Diabetes: The art of practice” will be held 7:30 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. on March 14. Click here to register and get more information.