EyeCon 2023: Bringing collaborative OD and MD education to life

A. Paul Chous, OD, MA, FAAO, co-chair of the 2023 EyeCon meeting, caught up with Optometry Times®' assistant managing editor, Emily Kaiser, to share the exciting things he's looking forward do for this year's meeting.

The third annual EyeCon meeting will be held December 1-2, 2023, at the Marriott Sanibel Harbour Resort & Spa in Sanibel Harbour, Florida.

To learn more about the meeting and register, visit PER's website here.

Transcript

Editor's note: This transcript has been edited for clarity.

Emily Kaiser:

Hi, everyone. I'm Emily Kaiser with Optometry Times, and today we're sitting down with Dr Paul Chous, co-chair of EyeCon, which will be held December 1 and 2 in 2023, in Sanibel Island, Florida. Welcome, Dr Chous, thank you so much for taking the time to be here.

A. Paul Chous, OD, MA, FAAO:

Emily, it's great to talk with you as always; really excited about this conference.

Kaiser:

Yeah, absolutely. So first, can you tell us a little bit more about EyeCon—what makes it special?

Chous:

Well, I think one of the things that distinguishes our meeting is it's a joint meeting of both optometry and ophthalmology. We have 2 tracks going on this year. The idea is to let attendees kind of switch back and forth between the different tracks so optometrists could go into the ophthalmology track and vice versa, depending on specific talks, it maybe interests them the most.

But I think it's great that we're all meeting in this collegial fashion. You know, we've got common industry partners. I think that just is something that distinguishes it from many of the other eye care meetings that we're all familiar with.

Kaiser:

Absolutely. And what are you most excited about for this year's meeting?

Chous:

Well, there's so much.

One thing is that we have the preeminent myopia control researcher in the whole world—Mark Bullimore, [who] is going to be speaking. I think there's some other people on his panel, but I'm not sure who yet. That's going to be a joint session on day 1 with optometry and ophthalmology.

Also on day 1, it's both groups included together. We're going to have multiple other symposia on topics ranging from updates in OCT imaging, updates on neurotrophic keratitis, dry eye, retinal disease management, and that like.

On day 2, that's the optometry track. I'm really personally excited about a talk I'm giving with Mark Dunbar from Bascom Palmer Eye Institute and my dear friend and great speaker, Jeff Gerson from Kansas City on retinal disease comanagement.

We've got some other great topics that day. Kelly Nichols, dry eye expert [and] extraordinaire, [will] be doing a dry eye panel. We've got Kelly Malloy, who's a neuro-optometry, neuro-ophthalmology guru, that's going to have another panel on neuro-ophthalmic disease.

I think it's gonna be a great program. It's a great place to be, South Florida on the Gulf Coast. I looked it up, [and] the mean temperature in the beginning of December is about 76 degrees. I think a lot of us in other parts of the country will appreciate being in that warmer environment.

Kaiser:

Absolutely. So what was a hit last year at the inaugural icon that you're excited to take to the next level this year?

Chous:

Yeah. So, maybe one of the talks most well received was a new innovations [and] new therapies in eye care talk that was given by Dr Jade Coates and Dr Adam Ramsey. They were a big hit. We're going to have them again this year, giving a similar talk [on] all the newest kinds of technologies, as well as therapeutic pharmacologic advances and eye care over the last year. I think that's going to be a big hit.

Kaiser:

Fantastic. Do you have anything else you'd like to share about EyeCon?

Chous:

I really want to encourage people to attend. I really would love to see as many people as possible at our meeting. We're getting a lot of sponsorship involved. There's going to be a lot of great companies. It's an opportunity to network with your colleagues in both optometry and ophthalmology. [I'm] really looking forward to seeing you in December in Florida.

Kaiser:

Thank you so much for taking the time to chat today, Dr Chous, and I can't wait to see you in Florida.

Chous:

Thanks, Emily.