Dear Colleagues:

 

It is exciting for me to inform you that we have received a number of abstracts for the upcoming annual IOSS meeting “Pterygium: New Pathogenesis and Treatments”. The tentative program is as follows:

 

Opening Lecture: Professor Minas Coroneo: UV Light and Focusing in Pterygium

 

Section I: Pathogenesis

 

a.   Tan: epithelial changes, p53, and apoptosis, and fibroblast proliferation.

b.       Coroneo: Overexpression of MMPs by epithelial cells

c.       Meller: Overexpression of MMPs by fibroblasts and relationship to conjunctivochalasis

d.       Solomon: Role of inflammation on upregulating MMP expression in pterygium fibroblasts

e.       Tsai: Transformed properties of pterygium fibroblasts

f.         Touhami: Myofibroblasts in pterygium fibrovascular tissue

g.       Grueterich: Overexpression of IGFBP2

h.       Yei: Overexpression of PDGF-BB

i.         Buerman: Differential gene expression

 

IOSS Lecture Award: Professor Shigeru Kinoshita (Title to be announced)

 

Section II: Surgical Procedures

            Tan: Definition of Recurrence and Outcome Measures

 

A.      Conjunctival Autograft

a.       Anduze: Series presentation

b.       Joyaux: Series presentation

c.       Tan: Series presentation

d.       Koranyi: Series presentation (with Tissue glue)

e.       How I do it (Video) Panel: Coroneo, Joyaux, John, Koranyi, Raju Sangwan, Tan

 

B.      Amniotic Membrane Graft vs Conjunctival Autograft

a.       Sangwan: Series presentation (primary and recurrent)

b.       Ma: Series presentation (primary and recurrent)

c.       Solomon: Series presentation (primary and recurrent)

 

C.      AMG and CA for Recurrent Pterygium

a.       Shimmura: Series presentation

b.       Park: Series presentation

c.       Ti: Series presentation

d.       How I do it (Video) Panel (B and C): John, Ma, Park, Sangwan, Shimmura, Tseng

 

D.      MMC

a.       Solomon: Series presentation and Video

b.       Sangwan: Multiple recurrence (with CA and AMT) and Video

 

E.      Managing Unusual Pterygium and Complications

a.       Multiple layer AMG for xeroderma pigmentosum-related pterygium

b.      Ma: Series presentation- AMG for Scleral melt

c.       Sangwan: Series presentation- AMG and immunosuppression for scleral melt

d.      Espana: AMG and CLAU for total limbal deficiency

 

Section III: New Therapies

 

a.       Fossarello: PDT and histochemistry analysis of specimens

b.       Mannis: Pericardium as graft

c.       Ang: Ex vivo expansion

d.       Karp: IFN for CIN in pterygium management

e.       Huang: Pseudopterygium

 

 

For those who are still interested in presenting or would like to ask your colleagues to present in this meeting, you should submit the abstract (see www.ioss.org) and contact Dr. Tseng before March 25.

 

For those who will be speakers or have decided to attend this meeting and for those who would like to encourage your colleagues (including the associates of the speakers) to attend this meeting, please register as a new member or renew your membership by going to the website: www.ioss.org.

 

I am looking forward to seeing you at the meeting.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

Scheffer C. G. Tseng, M.D., Ph.D.

President