FORCED-DUCTION INSTRUMENT FOR ROUTINE OPERATING ROOM USE

STRABISMUS OCCURS IN 2 TO 4 PERCENT OF THE POPULATION. IN THE UNITED STATES, 83,000 STRABISMUS OPERATIONS ARE PERFORMED ANNUALLY, AND 20 TO 50 PERCENT REQUIRE REOPERATION. THIS PROJECT WILL DEVELOP CLINICAL DIAGNOSTIC INSTRUMENTATION THAT HAS THE POTENTIAL OF REDUCING THESE REOPERATIONS BY 20 PERCENT. AN OPTOELECTRONIC RESEARCH INSTRUMENT HAS BEEN DEVELOPED FORPRECISELY MEASURING AND ANALYZING THE PASSIVE ORBITAL STIFFNESS (LENGTH-TENSION) CURVES OF MONKEYS. SINCE 1985, VARIOUS VERSIONS OF THIS INSTRUMENT HAVE BEEN USED SUCCESSFULLY TO RUN HUNDREDS OF ORBITAL STIFFNESS CURVES ON MONKEYS IN MORE THAN 50 EXPERIMENTS. ALTHOUGH VERY ACCURATE, THE CURRENT RESEARCH EQUIPMENT IS TOO UNWIELDY, TOO SLOW TO SET UP, AND TOO BULKY FOR ROUTINE CLINICAL USE. IT IS PLANNED TO TRANSFORM THIS RESEARCH INSTRUMENTATION INTO A PRACTICAL, CONVENIENT, EASY-TO-USE PROTOTYPE CLINICALINSTRUMENT TO PERMIT QUANTITATIVE FORCED-DUCTION TESTS IN THE OPERATING ROOM. A SERIES OF CLINICAL TESTS ON PATIENTS UNDERGOING EYE SURGERY WILL BE CONDUCTED TO BEGIN BUILDING A REFERENCE DATABASE ON THE RELATIONSHIP OF ORBITAL STIFFNESS CURVES TO VARIOUS FORMS OF STRABISMUS-THYROID OPHTHALMOPATHY, MULTIPLEREOPERATIONS, STRABISMUS AFTER RETINAL DETACHMENT REPAIR, AND ORBITAL FLOOR FRACTURES-WITH THE LONG-TERM OBJECTIVE OF PROVIDING THE CLINICIAN WITH NEW DIAGNOSTIC AIDS IN THE FORM OF COMPUTERIZED DISPLAYS OF NORMAL AND ABNORMAL OCULAR LENGTH-TENSION CURVES.