: Purpose:  To examine whether vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) as one of the most important intraocular cytokines for angiogenesis and increased vascular permeability is associated with Coats’ disease.Methods:  The clinical interventional study included 28 patients with Coats’ disease and seven control patients with congenital cataract. During intraocular surgery, we obtained aqueous humour samples in which the VEGF concentration was measured by double‐antibody sandwich enzyme‐linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Coats’ disease was graded into four stages.Results:  The mean aqueous VEGF level was significantly higher in the Coats’ study group than in the control group (158 ± 88 versus 97 ± 21 pg/ml; p = 0.002). The VEGF concentrations increased significantly (p < 0.001) from 91 ± 32 pg/ml in Coats’ disease stage 2 to 100 ± 37 pg/ml in stage 3A1, 185 ± 56 pg/ml in stage 3A2 to 256 ± 93 pg/ml in patients with stage 3B. Vascular endothelial growth factor concentrations in Coats’ stage 2 and 3A1 did not differ significantly from the values in the control group. Parallel to the association with the stage of the diseases, the VEGF concentrations were significantly (p < 0.001) correlated with extent of exudative retinal detachment.Conclusions:  Increasing severity of Coats’ disease is significantly associated with intraocular VEGF concentrations. These results favour the intravitreal application of anti‐VEGF drugs as medical therapy of Coats’ diseases.

Methotrexate (MTX) is a folate analog widely used against a range of diseases including malignancies and autoimmune disorders. Its high effectiveness-price ratio also won extensive application in ophthalmology. On the other hand, although MTX has an excellent pharmacological efficacy, MTX associated side effects in clinical use, which vary from patient to patient, are nonnegligible. There is no comparatively systematic review on MTX associated side effects and its risk factors. This review aimed to reveal novel clinical approaches of MTX and its adverse effects in order to provide a reference for ophthalmic scholars in clinical application of MTX.

To evaluate the role of plasma total homocysteine (tHcy) and homozygosity for the thermolabile variant of the methylenetetrahydrofolate reductase (MTHFR) C677T genotype in the risk of retinal vein occlusion (RVO). Relevant studies were selected through an extensive search of PubMed, EMBASE, and the Web of Science databases. Summary weighted mean differences (WMDs) or odds ratios (ORs) and 95% confidence intervals (CI) were calculated with a random-effects model. Forty-two studies with 6445 participants were included in this updated systematic review and meta-analysis. The mean plasma tHcy level in the RVO patients was significantly higher than in the controls (WMD =2.13 μmol/L; 95% CI: 1.29 to 2.98, P < 0.001), but there was evidence of between-study heterogeneity (P < 0.001). No significant association between MTHFR C677T genotype and RVO was found under all genetic models. There was some evidence that plasma tHcy is associated with an increased risk of RVO. There was no evidence to suggest an association between homozygosity for the MTHFR C677T genotype and RVO.

The objective of this study was to report a case of bilateral necrotizing retinitis following viral encephalitis caused by the pseudorabies virus. A 49-year-old male had decreased bilateral visual ...

Background: To date, various treatments for cystoid macular edema (CME) in retinitis pigmentosa (RP) have been reported. We performed a systematic review and meta-analysis to evaluate the efficacy and safety of current treatments for RP-CME.Methods: PubMed, Embase and the Cochrane library were searched from inception to August 2021. ClinicalTrials.gov, WHO ICTRP and ISRCTN were also searched for relevant studies. Only studies published in English were included. The RoB 2 tool was used to evaluate the risk of bias of randomized controlled trials (RCTs), and the MINORS scale was used to assess the methodological quality of non-RCTs. Review manager (Revman) was used to pool the data. The primary outcomes included the change of central macular thickness (CMT) and best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA) from baseline. The secondary outcomes included fluorescein angiography (FA) leakage, rebound of CME and adverse effects.Results: Thirty-two studies were included in the current systematic review and 7 studies were used for meta-analysis. Treatments for RP-CME included oral and topical carbonic anhydrase inhibitors (CAIs), systematic and local steroids, anti-VEGF therapy, NSAIDS, grid LASER photocoagulation, subliminal micropulse LASER, vitrectomy, lutein supplement and oral minocycline. CAIs and local steroids were proved to be effective in reducing CMT. The effects of anti-VEGF reagents varied among studies. Regarding other treatments, only one study for each method fitted the inclusion criteria, so the evidence was very limited.Conclusion: Topical CAIs, oral CAIs and local steroids are effective in treating RP-CME. However, due to the overall inferior design and small patient number of the included studies, the quality of evidence was poor. Systematic steroids, LASER, NSAIDS and vitrectomy may also be effective, nevertheless, considering the limited number of studies, no conclusion could be drawn regarding these treatments. More well-designed and conducted studies are needed in this field.Systematic Review Registration: https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?ID=CRD42021273979, identifier CRD42021273979.