Science and art combine for improved patient outcomes

San Francisco-New technology can help ophthalmologists care for their patients if they combine it with a personal touch, said Paul P. Lee, MD, JD, in the Shaffer-Hetherington-Hoskins Lecture during the Glaucoma 360 CME Symposium.

“Wisdom comes from a combination, in one way of looking at the world, of combining the science that we have with the art of medicine,” said Dr. Lee, professor and chairman, Department of Ophthalmology, and director, W.K. Kellogg Eye Center, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.

Listen as Paul Lee, MD, delivers the 2015 Shaffer-Hetherington-Hoskins Lecture on its entirety.

One lesson from science that ophthalmologists can apply is that early glaucoma entails no visual field loss. So ophthalmologists must assess the nerve and nerve fiber layer carefully.

In the European Optic Disc Assessment Trial, ophthalmologists from 11 European countries classified 40 healthy eyes and 48 glaucomatous eyes with varying severity on stereoscopic slides.

The ophthalmologists ranged in accuracy from 61% to 94%. The researchers concluded that common imaging devices outperform most clinicians.

“The reading centers are at least as good as the physicians,” Dr. Lee said. “Physicians tend to underestimate the severity of disease as compared with the reading centers.”

 

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