Bill Harvey: The shock of the new – embrace change

My recent trawl around instrument suppliers at Optrafair emphasised the dynamic nature of clinical assessments.

Techniques for screening for diseases, monitoring eyes under suspicion and assessing the impact of treatments continue to evolve.

It seems that some areas have developed over the last few decades, way beyond anything that might have been predicted 20 years ago. Imaging is a good example here. It is not too long ago that retinal photography was a specialist test.

Dilation was the norm and the image taken on a mounted analogue camera needed to be developed like any photographic film once the reel was finished. We now have high resolution digital imaging, trans-tissue visualisation and analysis with OCT technology, and ultra-wide field scanning laser ophthalmoscopy capable of near full retinal assessment and monitoring.