IKA Keratoconus Symposium 2023: Welcome to the inaugural event!

Video transcript

S. Barry Eiden, OD, FAAO, FSLS:
Hello, everybody, and welcome to the first annual International Keratoconus Academy's Keratoconus Symposium. We're here in Scottsdale, Arizona; beautiful time of year. The desert is in bloom and the education is amazing.

We are so happy to have some of the greatest experts in the field of keratoconus presenting at our first annual meeting. We started out with a great session from Drs. Renato Ambrosio and Michael Belin. These are two of the greatest names in keratoconus, talking about some of the newest technologies, also talking about how we need to look at research and be a little bit more critical about methods that are used in some of the papers that are published in some of the most respected journals.

We'll be having sessions relating to keratoconus diagnosis, and we know that one of the most important things for us in the field of keratoconus is the ability to make the diagnosis early as possible before, if possible, vision loss. Why? Because we can prevent vision loss with technologies that have been developed, like corneal cross-linking, that can stop the progression of the disease. So this becomes critically important.

We'll be moving on to therapeutic methods in keratoconus, and vision correction with contact lenses and other optical modalities to some of the surgical techniques utilized, and a very deep dive into corneal cross-linking as well. There's so many topics that we're going to talk about.

Very close to my heart is the issue of pediatric keratoconus, and I say that because once again, it gets to the mantra of our organization, the International Keratoconus Academy, and that is: Early diagnosis; early treatment. So, we'll have a session on the management of the pediatric patient as it relates to keratoconus, which I'll be moderating and really excited to be involved with.

So hopefully people are learning tremendous amounts of information, the most current information from some of the greatest people in this field, and we're excited and we look forward to next year's meeting in Bethesda, Maryland in May of 2024 at the second annual International Keratoconus Symposium. Thank you.