Council on Research

Summer Invitational Research Institute

SUMMER RESEARCH INSTITUTES YIELD OVER $58 MILLION IN GRANTS

AOA calls for 6.7% NEI funding hike

Karla Zadnik, O.D., Ph.D., chair of AOA’s Council of Research, testifies before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, Education and Related Agencies.

In her recent testimony before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, AOA's Council on Research chair Karla Zadnik, O.D., Ph.D., called on Congress to increase funding for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) 6.7 percent to $31 billion, and to fund NIH’s National Eye Institute (NEI) at $711 million (also a 6.7% increase) for the federal government’s 2008 fiscal year.

The NEI has achieved a number of breakthroughs in basic and clinical research in recent years, largely because the overall NIH budget was doubled, by mutual consent of Congress and the White House, in the 1990s and early 2000s. The proposed 6.7 percent funding increase is needed to ensure that research is now used to develop new treatments and therapies to prevent eye disease and restore vision. Increased NEI funding will allow for development of early-detection diagnostics and promising therapies for age-related macular degeneration (AMD), based on the recent disovery of the gene responsible for AMD. It will also allow for Age-Related Eye Disease Study (AREDS) trials on the use of dietary supplements as a potentially cost effective means of preventing advanced stages of AMD.

The Council on Research continues to be proud of the success of the biannual Summer Research Institutes that we have co-sponsored with the American Academy of Optometry. From their inception in l988, the Summer Research Institutes have resulted in optometrists receiving over $58 million in clinical research grants.

The 2006 Summer Research Institute was held in Columbus, OH, on July 31-August 4, 2006. Twenty-six optometrists from across the country participated in this program to develop four new cutting-edge research projects. The Institute Faculty included members of the Council on Research, experts in the areas of Cornea, Glaucoma, and Neuro-optics, and experts in biometry and research design.

As in past “Summer Camps,” optometric scientists received lectures from seasoned research veterans about how to formulate research questions, design research and write proposals. Research Workgroups formed around the following: children’s myopia and wave front technology, glaucoma, uncorrected refractive error in community health centers, and traumatic brain injury/neuro-optometry. The Research Workgroups will continue to work on developing the research protocol for clinical studies that might be fundable by the National Eye Institute (NEI), industry or other sources.

NEI FUNDING TO OPTOMETRY

The AOA Council on Research is pleased to report that funding for vision research by optometrists, and by optometrists and other scientists at the schools and colleges of optometry, from the National Eye Institute of NIH, continues to be strong. The funding for basic, translational and clinical research projects by optometry was $22.9 million with 87 individual awards in FY-2006. There were eight competing grant awards in FY-2006 that were not funded in FY-2005.

However, overall NEI budgets for investigator-initiated projects and for clinical trials have effectively decreased in the past two years as the NIH budget has remained flat. The “tight” NEI budget was expected to have some repercussions on optometry funding in the subsequent years. Thus, there was an actual decrease from FY-2005 of fifteen grants for projects that were completed, and two grants for investigators who moved to foreign or non-optometry institutions. On balance, half of the 15 completed projects included Principal Investigators who already had other NEI grants. Thus, optometry research is sustained even as the NIH experiences hard times, and optometry investigators continue to compete effectively.

The Council’s continued activities are related directly to the success in increased funding for grants, especially the clinical trial grants. Council continues to monitor the growth in funding to optometric research from the National Eye Institute.

For more information about eye research, go to www.nei.nih.gov.

CURRENT FEDERALLY FUNDED CLINICAL RESEARCH PROJECTS AT OPTOMETRIC INSTITUTIONS

CITT — The Convergence Insufficiency Treatment Trial is a randomized, controlled, single-masked, multi-center pilot study to compare the success rate of pencil push-up treatment, office-based vision therapy, and procedures simulating office-based vision therapy for the treatment of convergence insufficiency and develop more precise estimates of the success rates of these treatments for convergence insufficiency. The workgroup of optometrists first met at the 1988 Summer Research Institute to begin plans for a clinical trial addressing vision therapy. After many transitions and funded planning grants, in September 2004 NEI funded the CITT for five years for over $6 million.
CLEK — The Collaborative Longitudinal Evaluation of Keratoconus (CLEK) Study, an observational study of 1,200 keratoconus patients at 16 institutions, was initiated at the first Summer Research Institute in 1988. It is funded through September 2007 and has generated a total of almost $28 million to optometric institutions and investigators. To date, there are 33 publications attributable to the CLEK Study, and it has been termed "the household name" in keratoconus.
VISION IN PRESCHOOLERS (VIP) STUDY — VIP was awarded almost $11 million to five investigators at various schools and colleges of optometry. The primary goal of the VIP Study is to determine whether there are vision screening tests which can reliably predict preschool children who would benefit from comprehensive vision examinations. Results from Phase I of this study were published in April 2004 and results from Phase II was published in 2005. A new grant application is under review in 2007 by the National Institutes of Health.
CLEERE — The Collaborative Longitudinal Evaluation of Ethnicity and Refractive Error (CLEERE) Study is an extension of the Orinda Longitudinal Study of Myopia to other, non-Caucasian ethnic populations: Asian, Hispanic, African-American and Native Americans. CLEERE has enrolled more than 5,000 children at sites in Alabama, California, Arizona and Texas. The CLEERE Study is still following Native American children in Arizona and is analyzing longitudinal data from other groups. It is funded by the National Eye Institute through 2011.
OHTS — The Ocular Hypertension Treatment Study (OHTS) is a study evaluating the efficacy of treatment in patients with ocular hypertension. With over 40 medical sites nationwide, it is the only disease-based clinical study funded by NEI with one site at an optometric institution. The study is ongoing.
COMET — The Correction of Myopia Evaluation Trial (COMET), a multi-million dollar project with sites at Birmingham, Boston, Houston, and Philadelphia, to evaluate the potential value of near correction in youthful myopic individuals in retarding their myopic progression. NEI has funded a 5-year continuation of the study to follow progression of myopia into the teen years.
VA LOVITT — VA Low Vision Intervention Trial (VA LOVIT) is a randomized clinical trial that is being conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of a low vision rehabilitation program for veterans with moderate and severe vision loss due to macular diseases. Subjects include 126 veterans from Chicago and Salisbury, NC who were randomized to low vision rehabilitation or a usual care (waiting list) control group. Outcomes are the changes in patient self-report of difficulty performing reading, visual information processing, visual motor and mobility activities measured with the 48 item Veterans Affairs Low Vision Visual Functioning Questionnaire. The study received $1,295,757 in funding by the Rehabilitation Research and Development Service of the Department of Veterans Affairs. It is ongoing, but enrollment has closed.

COUNCIL ON RESEARCH MISSION

The purpose of the Council is to facilitate, assist and promote the development of optometric research. The duties of the Council on Research are as follows:

To be an advocate for optometric research;
To develop research goals and to provide assistance in the development of research proposals;
To foster cooperation between and within research communities, the profession, and scientific institutions;
To provide a central source of optometric research information to the profession; and
To perform other functions relating to research, as appropriate.

MEMBERSHIP

Karla Zadnik, O.D., Ph.D, chair;
Susan Cotter, O.D., M.S.
Timothy T. McMahon, O.D.
P. Sarita Soni, O.D.,M.S.
Joan Stelmack, O.D., M.P.H.
Uzma Zumbrink, M.P.H, Staff