Ophthalmic Pyogenic Granulomas Treated With Topical Timolol-Clinical Features of 17 Cases.

PURPOSE: Topical timolol has been increasingly demonstrated to be an effective treatment for pyogenic granulomas (PG). The authors review the treatment outcomes of 17 patients with ocular PG treated with topical timolol. METHODS: Retrospective interventional study of 17 patients with ocular PGs treated with timolol 0.5% solution. Patient demographics, clinical features, treatment response, and recurrence were noted. RESULTS: Nine females and 8 males with a mean age of 23 years (range, 3-67 years) were included. Mean duration of disease prior to treatment was 3.81 months (range, 0.25-11 months). Etiologies included chalazia (12 cases, 71%), postsurgical (4, 24%) and trauma (1, 6%). Five patients (29%) had treatment with topical steroids prior to presentation. Fifteen patients (88%) had PG located on the palpebral conjunctiva and 2 (12%) involving the bulbar conjunctiva. Mean lesion size was 5.06 × 6.06 mm (range, 3-8 × 3-18 mm). Fifteen patients (88%) had complete lesion resolution with a mean treatment duration of 3.07 weeks (range, 2-5 weeks) and no adverse events or recurrences with a mean follow up of 9.47 months (range, 6-27 months). Two patients (12%) underwent lesion excision after 6 weeks of timolol failed to yield resolution. CONCLUSION: Topical timolol appears to be a well-tolerated nonsurgical treatment of ocular PG in both children and adults. Clinicians may wish to consider topical timolol to treat PG as opposed to topical steroids, given the inherent risk of steroid response ocular hypertension and the difficulty to measure intraocular pressure in younger children who require general anesthesia for excision.

Eye injuries from electrical weapon probes: Incidents, prevalence, and legal implications.

PURPOSE: While generally reducing morbidity and mortality, electrical weapons have risks associated with their usage, including burn injuries and trauma associated with uncontrolled fall impacts. However, the prevalence of significant eye injury has not been investigated. METHODS: We searched for incidents of penetrating eye injury from TASER® conducted electrical weapon (CEW) probes via open source media, litigation filings, and a survey of CEW law-enforcement master instructors. RESULTS: We report 20 previously-unpublished cases of penetrating eye injury from electrical weapon probes in law-enforcement field uses. Together with the 8 previously published cases, there are a total of 28 cases out of 3.44 million field uses, giving a demonstrated CEW field-use risk of penetrating eye injury of approximately 1:123 000. Confidence limits [85 000, 178 000] by Wilson score interval. There have been 18 cases of total unilateral blindness or enucleation. We also present legal decisions on this topic. CONCLUSIONS: The use of electrical weapons presents a rare but real risk of total or partial unilateral blindness from electrical weapon probes. Catastrophic eye injuries appear to be the dominant non-fatal complication of electronic control.

Intravenous Steroids With Antibiotics on Admission for Children With Orbital Cellulitis.

PURPOSE: To compare the outcomes of children with orbital cellulitis treated with intravenous (IV) dexamethasone and antibiotics on admission to patients treated with antibiotics alone. METHODS: Prospective comparative interventional study. Forty-three children admitted to a tertiary institution with orbital cellulitis were enrolled. On admission, all patients were started on broad spectrum IV antibiotics and parents were offered IV dexamethasone (0.3 mg/kg/d every 6 hours for 3 days). Patients whose parents refused steroid treatment served as the control group. RESULTS: Twenty-eight (65%) patients received IV steroids and antibiotics on admission while 15 (35%) received IV antibiotics alone. Children who received IV steroids had significantly shorter hospital stays than those who did not receive steroids (3.8 ± 0.2 days vs. 6.7 ± 0.3 days; p < 0.001). This was true both for children who underwent surgery (5/28 with steroids, 3/15 without; 5.0 ± 0.7 days vs. 7.3 ± 1.2 days; p = 0.011) and for those who did not require surgical intervention (23/28 with steroids, 12/15 without; 3.6 ± 0.6 and 6.5 ± 1.0 days; p < 0.001). Side effects of steroid treatment were mild and did not require termination of therapy. During follow up, all study patients had returned to their baseline health without any cases of decreased vision or disease recurrence. CONCLUSIONS: The results of the current study give additional evidence to the relative safety and efficacy of systemic steroid use concurrently with IV antibiotics in children with orbital cellulitis. This is the first study to recommend IV steroids on hospital admission and a standardized dosing regimen. Children who received steroids had a shorter hospital stay than those who did not.

Orbital floor fracture with entrapment: Imaging and clinical correlations in 45 cases.

Orbital floor fractures (OFF) with entrapment require prompt clinical and radiographic recognition for timely surgical correction. Correct CT radiographic interpretation of entrapped fractures can be subtle and thus missed. We reviewed the clinical, radiographic and intraoperative findings of 45 cases of entrapped OFF to correlate pre- and intraoperative findings with radiography. Retrospective review and statistical analysis of 45 patients with OFF using the chi squared and Kruskal-Wallis tests. Main outcome measures included patient demographics, clinical features, radiologic interpretation, intraoperative findings, and treatment outcomes. Twenty-one cases (47%) had radiologic evaluations of orbital CT scans that included commentary on possible entrapment. Intraoperatively, 16 (76%) of these patients had the inferior rectus muscle incarcerated in the fracture, while 5 (24%) patients had incarceration of the orbital fat. Possibility of entrapment was not commented on in the radiology reports of the remaining 24 (53%) cases. Intraoperatively, 13 (54%) of these patients had the inferior rectus muscle incarcerated in the fracture, while 11 (46%) patients had incarceration of the orbital fat. It is vital to assess the possibility of entrapment, especially in young patients, in the setting of OFF as a delay in diagnosis may lead to persistent diplopia, disfigurement, or bradycardia. Most radiology reports did not mention the possibility of entrapment in this cohort. A key concept is that entrapment occurs when any orbital tissue (muscle or fat) is trapped in the fracture site.

What's New in Eyelid Tumors.

Eyelid malignancies represent between 5% and 10% of all skin cancers. Basal cell carcinoma is the most common, followed by squamous cell carcinoma, sebaceous cell carcinoma, Merkel cell carcinoma, and melanoma. The gold standard treatment for periocular epithelial malignancies is surgical excision. Given the constraints of the anatomy and function of the eyelids, excision with negative margins and reconstruction can be challenging. In cases of significant tissue invasion or metastasis, complete tumor removal may not be possible. This review examines the management of periocular skin cancer from diagnosis and staging, including the role of sentinel lymph node biopsy, to both surgical and nonsurgical treatment. The development of targeted drug therapy against specific genetic mutations in cutaneous malignancies has allowed for the treatment of specific cancer cells with less systemic toxicity than more traditional treatments.

IgG4-Related Disease of the Punctum and Canaliculus.

A 60-year-old man with no past medical history presented with a 14-month history of a painless medial left lower eyelid mass causing mechanical ectropion and discharge from the inferior punctum. Excisional biopsy was performed via a transconjunctival canaliculotomy and histopathology revealed a dense plasma cell infiltrate with IgG4+ plasma cells >100/high power field and an IgG4/IgG ratio of 65%. Serum IgG4 was found to be elevated at 224 mg/dl (reference range: 4-86 mg/dl). Systemic work up with PET CT was negative. The patient's signs and symptoms all resolved without medical treatment and he remains disease free 24 months following surgery. A single case of IgG4 disease of the nasolacrimal duct has been reported, but to the authors' knowledge, disease involving the proximal nasolacrimal outflow system has yet to be described. The authors herein report a case of IgG4-related disease involving the punctum and canaliculus.

Effects of gaboxadol on the expression of cocaine sensitization in rats.

Behavioral sensitization to psychostimulants is associated with changes in dopamine (DA), glutamate, and GABA within the mesocorticolimbic and nigrostriatal DA systems. Because GABAA receptors are highly expressed within these systems, we examined the role of these receptors containing a δ subunit in cocaine behavioral sensitization. Experiment 1 examined the effects of Gaboxadol (GBX, also known as THIP [4,5,6,7-tetrahydro-isoxazolo[5,4-c]pyridin-3-ol]), a selective δ-GABAA receptor agonist, on the locomotor responses to acute cocaine. GBX at 1.25 mg/kg produced locomotor depression in female rats alone. We then examined the effects of GBX on the expression of cocaine-induced locomotion and stereotypy in female and male rats treated with 5 days of cocaine (15 mg/kg) followed by cocaine challenge 7 days later. We administered systemic (Experiment 2) or intranucleus accumbens (intra-NAC; Experiment 3) injections of GBX (0, 1.25, 2.5, 5, or 10 mg/kg subcutaneously, or 1 µmol/L or 1 mM intra-NAC, respectively) prior to cocaine challenge (10 mg/kg). In our experiments females were robustly sensitized to cocaine at low dose whereas males did not show such sensitization-limiting comparisons between the 2 sexes. Sensitized females showed a biphasic response to low (1.25 mg/kg and 1 µmol/L) and high (10 mg/kg and 1 mM) dose GBX whereas nonsensitized males showed this pattern only following intra-NAC injection. Immunohistochemical analysis of the NAC revealed that females have more δ-containing GABAA receptors than do males and that following chronic cocaine injections this difference persisted (Experiment 4). Together, our results support the notion of the key role of extrasynaptic GABAA δ-subunit containing receptors in cocaine sensitization.