Clinical Research

The Center plays an important role in the process of advancing clinical research in this country. We have sponsored numerous research projects in the areas of orbital myositis, ocular toxocara, and contact lens rehabilitation for congenital cataracts. The medical staff at the Center has contributed to several chapters in ophthalmology books, landmark papers concerning the treatment of acute dacryocystitis in newborns, the classification and treatment of bilateral superior oblique palsy and secondary angle closure glaucoma in children with retinopathy of prematurity.

Our primary goal is to develop innovative and less invasive therapies for vision threatening disorders. Every breakthrough treatment for disease or injury begins with research, and clinical research allows the physician to make important observations on the patient’s disease and outcome after treatment. Clinical research shows what is happening in real time with real patients, our patients, not what is going on in the test tube.

• Published Strabismus Precipitated by Monovision in the American Journal of Ophthalmology, September 2011.
• Dr. Zane Pollard was the first ophthalmologist to publish a paper introducing the surgical use of a silicone expander to both superior oblique tendons in patients with nystagmus who have a chin-up position in which the nystagmus slows in downgaze.
• Drs. Zane Pollard and Marc Greenberg have published medical papers on surgery for inferior oblique palsy using a silicone expander to the superior oblique tendon.
• The Center has had numerous papers published concerning the diagnosis and treatment of ocular toxocara (ocular larva from dogs found in the eyes of children who ingest contaminated dirt.) We pioneered the ELISA blood test for toxocara, developed in conjunction with the Center for Disease Control in Atlanta, Georgia. Dr. Pollard and his associate, Dr. William Hagler, taught a course on the diagnosis and treatment of ocular toxocara at the American Academy of Ophthalmology.