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AOA Forms National Commission on Vision and Health

AOA ENTITY SEEKS ROLE IN NATIONAL HEALTHCARE POLICY

■ The American Optometric Association (AOA) has created a National Commission on Vision and Health (NCVH) to develop the association's position on national healthcare issues, particularly as they relate to vision, says the AOA's president Kevin L. Alexander.

"We [the AOA] want healthcare policy makers to view optometry as the true healthcare profession that it is, instead of simply as a group of practitioners who, for instance, testify on a piece of legislation so a healthcare plan will include them. In other words, we want to dispel the notion that the AOA is a parochial advocate," he says.

"For example, if there's a bill before Congress to fund smoking cessation programs, we want to have the opportunity to weigh in on that, as smoking has an impact on the eyes. The National Commission on Vision and Health would seek to ensure the AOA gets such an opportunity."

The 12-member Committee is comprised of optometrists, pharmacists, public-health professionals and former employees of health insurance companies.

"This diverse group of healthcare professionals will help the AOA decide which national healthcare issues we want to weigh in on and how, specifically, to effectively deliver our views to the powers that be, whether that be in the form of white papers, expert testimony, etc.," says Dr. Alexander. "The bottom line is that when we're presenting our view on a specific healthcare issue, we want to be armed with high-quality referenced materials and experts that can effectively back-up our views. I'm not saying our testimony in the past hasn't been good, I'm just saying that the credibility of references and experts would send the message to healthcare policy members that our positions do not revolve around advocating just for the inclusion of optometric services, for example."

Dr. Alexander says the idea to form the Commission was born out of several years of being involved in advocacy — he's worked on many scope-of-practice bills — and wishing there was an arm of the profession that could provide him with legitimate referenced information or expert testimony on broad healthcare issues.

The National Commission on Vision and Health, with Barry Barresi,-O.D., Ph. D. as the founding chair, is scheduled to have its first meeting this month, says Dr. Alexander. As Dr. Barresi assumes his duties as executive director of the AOA this summer, Edwin C. Marshall, O.D., will chair the NCVH going forward.

Invention Shocks Retinal Cells Into Life

HAND-HELD DEVICE USES ELECTRICAL CURRENTS TO STIMULATE RETINAL CELLS.

■ ScyFIX, a multi-national company based in Minneapolis, has created a hand-held device that it says can restore vision, via electrical stimulation, in individuals who have the dry form of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), retinitis pigmentosa and glaucoma. Specifically, the company says the instrument stimulates the release of retinal neuroprotective factors (rescuing optic nerve, retinal interneuron and photoreceptor cells from apoptosis), raises adenosine triphosphate (ATP) synthesis, improves microvascular circulation in retinal cells and re-polarizes interneurons (reducing the number of misfiring and non-firing retinal cells).

Named the ScyFIX MCN (MicroCurrent Neuromodulation) 650, the device is roughly eight inches long, four-inches wide and one-inch thick and has electrodes, or lead wires, affixed to four sticky pads.

"The patient places a pad on each eyelid and the corresponding pad to the top of each of his hands for a 20-minute therapy session when he wakes in the morning and just before he goes to sleep at night," explains Thomas W. Harold, the device's inventor and ScyFIX founder and chief executive officer.

"The pad on top of each corresponding hand completes the circuit for each eye. The patient then uses the device to control the level of the electrical current, based on how it feels — a kind of tingling — on their eyes, hands, face or teeth."

In the future, after more learning, ScyFIX will likely have different therapy protocols for how often and how long patients should use the device, but for now, Mr. Harold says, the company knows that twice per day provides the best results.

The ScyFIX CEO says he thought of the idea about six years ago, during a business meeting, where one of his colleagues said, "You know, I hear that electricity can cure blindness." Intrigued, Mr. Harold, a former executive at Pillsbury, says he began conducting some research and discovered that anecdotal evidence existed for what his friend had said, though no one had taken it out of the lab (visit http://www.scyfix.org/clinical_studies.php.

"Right now, we're in dialogue with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) concerning the results of the FDA-sanctioned trials we conducted for the treatment of retinitis pigmentosa, dry AMD and open-angle glaucoma," says Mr. Harold. "While I can't comment specifically on our FDA-trial results, I can tell you that our experience over the past five years in countries outside the United States has revealed that within days and weeks of using our predecessor devices, many patients have said they're now able to see the faces of their family members again, they can thread needles, colors now appear more vibrant, and one retinitis-pigmentosa patient has reported that his vertical fields have opened up, enabling him to walk down the stairs unaided."

For more information on ScyFIX, visit http://www.scyfix.org.

New Standards for CE

RULES BECOME EFFECTIVE IN 2009

■ The Association of Regulatory Boards of Optometry (ARBO) has announced it will develop new standards for commercial support of Council on Optometric Practitioner Education (COPE)-approved continuing education, which will provide a "clear direction to both providers and industry," says the association.

The new standards wouldn't allow lecturers (or authors) to receive COPE approval for presentations that promote products, instruments or devices. The standards require the lecturer, not a company, to submit the course. In addition, an administrator, not a supporting company, must pay the lecturer. The lecturer must also include disclosure that addresses independence in preparing the course, conflicts of interest and appropriate use of commercial support and promotion. The lecturer must ensure that the content and format is without commercial bias and disclose any potential commercial bias. ARBO anticipates that full compliance required by July 1, 2009.

CIBA Vision Introduces CL

CIBA Vision has introduced AIR OPTIX for Astigmatism, a silicone-hydrogel monthly replacement contact lens FDA-approved for daily wear and up to six nights of extended wear. Features include: a Dk/t of 108 @ -3.00D, a 14.5mm diameter and a 8.7mm base curve. Parameters are from plano to -6.00D (in 0.25D steps), with cylinder powers of -0.75 and -1.25 and axes around-the-clock in 10° steps. A parameter expansion is forthcoming.