Back home from my penultimate day at my school job. They had a luncheon for me. Strange. Very strange. My preference would be to lock the door and walk out quietly. For some reason, they seem to think that is unacceptable.
Now I am sitting on the back deck eating slightly stale chips with the puppygirls. This is part of the reason I cannot be unemployed. The family sized bags I occasionally buy at the warehouse store would not have a chance to get stale! We would have to go on mommy/doggie diets!
I got everything I needed to finish at school done today. Also did a little outside (non-school) work. Don’t tell?. Tomorrow is just a formality. I will take stuff for the counseling center and also stuff to prepare for the adult education, mini, mini-course I will hopefully be teaching in the fall.
I decided it was time to put up or shut up. I am doing a very brief, three-session course on Age-Related Macular Degeneration. If I get any takers, that is. It all depends upon whether or not I have students.
So any thoughts on what I should cover? Lin thinks I should include the new stuff they are doing with the “brachytherapy” device. Maybe I would if I knew what it was!
Fortunately, Lin included an EyeNet post all about it.
First of all, the online dictionary tells me that brachytherapy is a way to fight cancer. Sealed radiation sources are placed in the tissue near the area that requires treatment.
Since we don’t have cancer, I guess I need to read the EyeNet article and see how this treatment relates to us.
Once again this is a treatment for wet AMD. (Not funny guys. I really think Daddy likes you better!). It is another crack at improving the effectiveness of anti-VEGF drugs through a combo therapy approach. They are interested in reducing the burden of regular eye shots.
Unfortunately, results have been mixed. CABERNET fell short of its goals. (I prefer a good Moscato myself. However, if they are naming their studies after wines, I think I want to be invited to their Christmas party ?).
The INTREPID study used an x-ray based treatment and got good results. Combined with their x-ray based treatment, eye shots were needed nearly a third less often. They also reported visual acuity at least as good if not better than eye shot treatment alone.
There is more to the article. I will read through it and see what they have to say about irradiation and wet AMD. Maybe add it to the next page. Suffice it here to say anti-VEGF treatments are evolving to the next level. Combination treatments will soon make it so you rarely need to go for eye shots. All in all, not a bad thing.
Catch up with you later!?
Written June 4th, 2018