Chong-Bin Tsai

Objective: Most neurological diseases are usually accompanied by changes in the oculomotor nerve. Analysis of different types of eye movements will help provide important information in ophthalmology, neurology, and psychology. At present, many scholars use optokinetic nystagmus (OKN) to study the physiological phenomenon of eye movement. OKN is an involuntary eye movement induced by a large moving surrounding visual field. It consists of a slow pursuing eye movement, called “slow phase” (SP), and a fast re-fixating saccade eye movement, called “fast phase” (FP). Non-invasive video-oculography has been used increasingly in eye movement research. However, research-grade eye trackers are often expensive and less accessible to most researchers. Using a low-cost eye tracker to quantitatively measure OKN eye movement will facilitate the general application of eye movement research. Methods & Results: We design an analytical algorithm to quantitatively measure OKN eye movements on a low-cost eye tracker. Using simple conditional filtering, accurate FP positions can be obtained quickly. The high-precision FP recognition rate is of great help for the subsequent calculation of eye movement analysis parameters, such as mean slow phase velocity (MSPV), which is beneficial as a reference index for patients with strabismus and other eye diseases. Conclusions: Experimental results indicate that the proposed method achieves faster and better results than other approaches, and can provide an effective algorithm to calculate and analyze the FP position of OKN waveforms.

Optokinetic nystagmus (OKN) is an involuntary eye movement induced by motion of a large proportion of the visual field. It consists of a “slow phase (SP)” with eye movements in the same direction as the movement of the pattern and a “fast phase (FP)” with saccadic eye movements in the opposite direction. Study of OKN can reveal valuable information in ophthalmology, neurology and psychology. However, the current commercially available high-resolution and research-grade eye tracker is usually expensive. Methods & Results: We developed a novel fast and effective system combined with a low-cost eye tracking device to accurately quantitatively measure OKN eye movement. Conclusions: The experimental results indicate that the proposed method achieves fast and promising results in comparisons with several traditional approaches.

Background/Purpose: The concept of adjustable suture has been developed in strabismus surgeries for nearly four decades. This technique is not yet universally embraced by strabismus surgeons, especially in pediatric patients. The aim of this study is to describe and evaluate the application of the adjustable suture with pull-string technique in pediatric patients. Methods: A retrospective medical record review was conducted for patients aged 18 years and under who received adjustable suture strabismus surgery using short tag sliding noose with pull-string technique. For the analysis, the patients were arbitrarily divided into three age groups: 6 years and younger, between 6 and 12 years, and 12 years and older. Patients were examined at 1 week and 1, 3, and 6 months after surgery. Results: A total of 123 patients were enrolled in this study. The mean age at the time of surgery was 9.4 years, ranging from 0.7 to 18.4 years. Eighteen (14.6%) patients required adjustment and 105 (85.4%) patients did not require adjustment. The average follow-up was 10.2 months (range, 1–48 months). At their final postoperative follow-up, 93 of 123 (75.6%) patients were within 10 prism diopters of orthophoria. The success rates were 77.6% (66/85) in exotropia patients and 71.1% (27/38) in esotropia patients. The success rates were 76.4% (84/110) for those who receive the procedure as primary surgery and 69.2% (9/13) for those who receive the procedure as reoperative surgery. Of the 18 patients who required adjustment, 16 (88.9%) patients were successful. Of the 105 patients who did not require adjustment, 77 (73.3%) patients were successful. Conclusion: This study showed that the pull-string technique provided similar success rate compared to those reported in literature in pediatric patients. The pull-string technique is developed to simplify the postoperative adjustments. Many surgeons encounter difficulties to handle the postoperative adjustments, especially when they need to retrieve the buried subconjunctival adjustable sutures. The obstacles are reduced with the aid of pull string. Using the pull-string technique, the surgeon can perform adjustable suture surgeries in any age group with confidence.

Taiwan Journal of Ophthalmology, Taiwan

Dermal papillae (DPs) control the formation of hair shafts. In clinical settings, colchicine (CLC) induces patients’ hair shedding. Compared to the control, the ex vivo hair fiber elongation of organ cultured vibrissa hair follicles (HFs) declined significantly after seven days of CLC treatment. The cultured DP cells (DPCs) were used as the experimental model to study the influence of CLC on the protein dynamics of DPs. CLC could alter the morphology and down-regulate the expression of alkaline phosphatase (ALP), the marker of DPC activity, and induce IκBα phosphorylation of DPCs. The proteomic results showed that CLC modulated the expression patterns (fold > 2) of 24 identified proteins, seven down-regulated and 17 up-regulated. Most of these proteins were presumably associated with protein turnover, metabolism, structure and signal transduction. Protein-protein interactions (PPI) among these proteins, established by Search Tool for the Retrieval of Interacting Genes/Proteins (STRING) database, revealed that they participate in protein metabolic process, translation, and energy production. Furthermore, ubiquitin C (UbC) was predicted to be the controlling hub, suggesting the involvement of ubiquitin-proteasome system in modulating the pathogenic effect of CLC on DPC.