Dr Silani meeting with leadership team at Johnson & Johnson Ocular Surface Disease

Dr Silani had the pleasure of meeting with the leadership team from Johnson & Johnson Vision's Ocular Surface Disease (seen above). At the meeting, he also met with other top dry eye specialists from around the country to discuss challenging cases and successes.

Important Takeaways:

1) According to the PHACO study, nearly 80 percent of patients coming in for cataract surgery have signs of at least stage 2 dry eye or worse, although most didn’t have a prior dry eye diagnosis.

2) Several recent studies have also shown that meibomian gland dysfunction (MGD) is present in 50 to 60 percent of the cataract surgery population. 3) Dry eye and MGD can affect pre-op cataract lens measurements as well as patients’ comfort, speed of recovery, and post-op satisfaction.

4) MGD is a result of obstructive disease and homeostatic control failure.

5) For most dry eye patients, it's not that they don't make enough tears, it's that the tears they make don't work properly. Our goal is to optimize the tear film quality, consistency, and stability as well as address ocular inflammation, biofilm, and oil gland obstruction.

6) FOUR MAIN CAUSES OF MGD: a) modern life digital device overuse interferes with normal blink patterns and reduces blink rate by up to 75%, b) certain systemic medications and medical conditions, c) hormone fluctuations, d) alterations in diet especially with decreased levels of EPA (a form Omega-3).

7) Conservative treatment alone is effective about 50-60% of the time for relieving symptoms (at-home remedies) but may NOT stop progression of the disease. Novel office-based treatments are ideal for early detection and intervention.

Beverly Hills Optometry Office-based treatments may include one or more of the following Lipiflow, TearCare ILux, BlephEx, IPL (OptiLight), ZEST, Prokera, punctal plugs, scleral lenses, gland probing.

For a new at-home option, we've recently had remarkable success with the chemical-free and drug-free neuro-stimulation device called the iTear100 (Gen 2 released this year). Ask for a demo at your next appointment.

Dr Silani: "Our team is committed to educating and empowering our patients. We are dedicated to enhancing the patient care experience as well as evolving our treatment protocol."