Improvement of reduced electroretinographic responses in thymoma-associated retinopathy: a case report and literature review.

PURPOSE: To report a patient with thymoma-associated retinopathy presenting as having a good visual prognosis. METHODS: Case report and literature review. CASE REPORT: A 42-year-old female patient was referred to our hospital for complaints of sudden visual-field defects bilaterally. Decimal corrected visual acuity (VA) was 1.5 and 1.2 in the right (RE) and left eyes (LE), respectively. Fundus autofluorescence revealed hyper-autofluorescence from the posterior pole to mid-peripheral retina in both eyes. Full-field electroretinography (ERG) amplitudes were reduced to 20-50% and 30-50% of our controls for the scotopic and photopic conditions, respectively. A systemic examination revealed the presence of thymoma, and the patient underwent thymectomy and immunosuppression therapies. Immunohistochemical analysis using the patient's serum showed immunolabeling on the photoreceptor inner segment and outer plexiform layer in the monkey retina. Two years later, VA remained at 1.5 and 1.2 in RE and LE. ERG amplitudes improved to 30-60% of the controls for the scotopic conditions. However, photopic ERG showed no remarkable change. CONCLUSIONS: To our knowledge, improvement of reduced rod-mediated ERG responses has not been described in seven previously reported patients with thymoma-associated retinopathy. The good visual prognosis of our patient may be associated with well-timed intervention.

Normal tension glaucoma-like degeneration of the visual system in aged marmosets.

The common marmoset (Callithrix jacchus) is a non-human primate that provides valuable models for neuroscience and aging research due to its anatomical similarities to humans and relatively short lifespan. This study was carried out to examine whether aged marmosets develop glaucoma, as seen in humans. We found that 11% of the aged marmosets presented with glaucoma-like characteristics; this incident rate is very similar to that in humans. Magnetic resonance imaging showed a significant volume loss in the visual cortex, and histological analyses confirmed the degeneration of the lateral geniculate nuclei and visual cortex in the affected marmosets. These marmosets did not have elevated intraocular pressure, but showed an increased oxidative stress level, low cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) pressure, and low brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and TrkB expression in the retina, optic nerve head and CSF. Our findings suggest that marmosets have potential to provide useful information for the research of eye and the visual system.

Better documentation in electronic medical records would lead to an increased use of lower extremity venous ultrasound in the inpatient setting: a retrospective study.

Aim: We hypothesized that the quality of the assessment of abnormal laboratory data in the emergency department (ED) could affect the hospital-attending physicians' decision-making after a patient's hospitalization. To test this hypothesis, we investigated how patients with a positive D-dimer result were reported by ED physicians in electronic medical records, and measured whether lower extremity venous ultrasonography examination was undertaken during hospitalization by the hospital-attending physicians. Methods: In an urban tertiary acute care general hospital in Japan, between January 2012 and December 2013, we included patients hospitalized after a positive D-dimer measurement (≥1.0 µg/mL) that was taken in the emergency department. We retrospectively measured the quality of ED physician assessments. Then we examined whether that affected the decisions of attending physicians to order lower extremity venous ultrasonography examinations during hospitalization. The exposure variable was the quality of the ED physicians' assessment of patients with positive D-dimer results. The outcome was whether a lower extremity venous ultrasonography examination was ordered by the attending physician during hospitalization. Results: When assessments were described by ED physicians for patients with positive D-dimer results, the attending physicians frequently ordered lower extremity venous ultrasonography (odds ratio, 10.74; 95% confidence interval, 5.92-19.50), even if the assessments only contained "copied and pasted" laboratory data (odds ratio, 1.68; 95% confidence interval, 2.10-2.40). Conclusions: Better documentation by ED physicians, regarding patients with positive D-dimer results, strongly affected the decisions made by attending physicians to order lower extremity venous ultrasonography examination.