INTRODUCTION Keratitis due to Nocardia infection is not commonly encountered in clinical practice and may therefore be mistaken for fungal or viral keratitis leading to delayed treatment and increased risk of permanent visual impairment. CASE An otherwise healthy 27 years old Caucasian Active Duty military member presented to the clinic with three days of light sensitivity and irritation of h...

PURPOSE To investigate the predominant causative pathogens and epidemiologic features of fungal keratitis and establish a rapid, specific molecular method to detect fungal keratitis caused by Fusarium solani. METHODS A total of 174 patients with presumed fungal keratitis and 174 affected eyes were examined. Isolates from corneal specimens were identified according to morphologic and physiolog...

BACKGROUND In the 4 year period (1988-91 there were nine cases of bacterial keratitis in five critically ill patients on an intensive care unit ('unit A'), all except one due to Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Many of these patients had serious ocular complications requiring surgery and all surviving patients were left with significant visual deficits. One further case of keratitis due to P aeruginosa ...

Acanthamoeba keratitis is uncommon, but one of the most severe infectious diseases of the cornea. Delayed diagnosis or misdiagnosis as bacterial or herpes simplex keratitis leads to extensive corneal inflammation and profound visual loss. Therefore, accurate and rapid diagnosis of Acanthamoeba keratitis is essential for successful treatment and good prognosis. We evaluated the usefulness of acr...

BACKGROUND Periphpral ulcerative keratitis (PUK) is a disorder consisting of a crescent-shaped destructive inflammation of the perilimbal corneal stroma. CASE We present a case of PUK following acute bacterial conjunctivitis in a 60-year-old lady with a history of on-and-off joint pain for two years. After admission to the hospital, she underwent conjunctival resection and was given topical a...

OBJECTIVE This experimental study was designed to investigate the safety and the effectiveness of Samjeong pharmacopuncture solution (SPS) manufactured by using a the lowtemperature extract on process. METHODS To identify the safety and the effectiveness of using SPS as eye drops, we performed applied eye irritation tests on rabbits and antibacterial tests for Staphylococcus aureus, Staphyloc...

PURPOSE To determine the minimum inhibitory concentrations (MICs) of 12 antimicrobials in current ophthalmic use and 4 potentially new alternatives against isolates from bacterial keratitis. METHODS Bacteria were collected from cases of bacterial keratitis in six centers in the United Kingdom between 2003 and 2006. MICs were measured by using susceptibility strips containing a concentration g...

PURPOSE This study evaluated the performance of donor corneoscleral rim cultures for predicting infection after corneal transplantation, and determines if there is a correlation between positive corneoscleral rim cultures and postkeratoplasty infection. DESIGN AND DATA SOURCES This was a systematic review, prognostic accuracy analysis, and cost-effectiveness analysis. Databases searched were:...

PURPOSE To determine whether interleukin-6 (IL-6) plays a protective role in Staphylococcus aureus keratitis in a gene knockout (gko) mouse model and to determine whether IL-6 may be used as a therapy to modulate host responses and control bacterial infection, thereby reducing scarring. METHODS The eyes of IL-6 gko mice and wild-type mice were challenged topically with S. aureus and examined ...

Hypoxia-inducible factor (HIF)-1α, is a transcription factor that controls energy metabolism and angiogenesis under hypoxic conditions, and a potent regulator of innate immunity. The studies described herein examined the role of HIF-1α in disease resolution in BALB/c (resistant, cornea heals) mice after ocular infection with Pseudomonas (P.) aeruginosa. Furthermore, the current studies focused ...