Bøger i Monographs in Ophthalmology serien

The chapters in this book were compiled by a trio of experts in the field of eye movements and contain discussions of anatomy and physiology of the ocular motor system, techniques of examination of patients with diplopia, and pathophysiology of specific disorders of ocular motility.

When the Board of Directors of the Belgian Ophthalmological Soci­ ety, in its session of November 26th 1978, asked me to prepare a report on strabismus to be presented at the joint meeting of the Dutch and Belgian Ophthalmological Societies to be held on June 13th 1981, I felt greatly honored but still more overwhelmed by the immensity of the task. I took advantage of the complete liberty given to me by the Board of Directors, first to limit the work to one particular form of strabismus, i.e. the convergent comitant form; second, to seek the help of what I thought to be the best strabologists in the Low Countries; third, to aim not at an encyclopedic treatise but at a practical volume destined to the general ophthalmologist. This volume is thus limited to the various aspects of convergent strabismus, more accurately of comitant convergent strabismus. The omission of the word" comitant" is purposely made to avoid the dif­ fic'ulties accompanying the explanation of this term and all the acroba­ tics needed to explain that most comitant strabismus are not complete­ ly comitant. The choice of this particular form of strabismus seems logical. First of all, it is the most common form of strabismus. On the other hand, most principles concerning examination and treatment can with some modifications be applied to other forms of strabismus.

Thirty years ago, our attention was drawn to the alphabetical incom­ itances in strabismus. As an elevation in adduction is the most frequent incomitance, we decided to start treating these incomitances. A weak­ ening procedure of the inferior oblique muscle seemed indicated. How­ ever, since we wanted to prevent a torsional overcorrection with a head tilt, we displaced the scleral insertion of the oblique muscle towards the equator of the globe. This way, the torsional action of the muscles is saved. A weakening of the horizontal rectus muscles was systematically added, making it a simultaneous horizontal and cyclovertical surgery. Our way to deal with strabismus developed into a coherent entity and the interest of colleagues encouraged us to write it down.We decided to publish a textbook with a theoretical and an extensive practical part. Our approach is based on thirty years of exclusive strabological work, half-time academic and half-time private practice. More than 6500 re­ sults were analysed and the majority have been published. The con­ cerned publications are referred to at the end of the first chapter. Private practice allowed to benefit from the fact that patients were operated on by the same surgeon and remained in personal contact during follow-up.

The diagnosis and treatment of children suffering from infantile encephalopathy is part of daily childneurological practice. In particular, a study has been made of visual impairment due to dysfunction of the central visual system (from optic chiasm to striate cortex).

This report for the Belgian Ophthalmological Society concerns a number of fundus diseases, which most ophthalmologists only rarely encounter.

The chapters in this book were compiled by a trio of experts in the field of eye movements and contain discussions of anatomy and physiology of the ocular motor system, techniques of examination of patients with diplopia, and pathophysiology of specific disorders of ocular motility.

When the Board of Directors of the Belgian Ophthalmological Soci ety, in its session of November 26th 1978, asked me to prepare a report on strabismus to be presented at the joint meeting of the Dutch and Belgian Ophthalmological Societies to be held on June 13th 1981, I felt greatly honored but still more overwhelmed by the immensity of the task.

It is fascinating to read how his concepts for the treatment of complicated retinal detachments evolved from the intra ocular use of silicone oil to a combination of vitreous surgery with silicone oil tamponade.

In its long series of annual reports, the Belgian Society of Ophthal­ mology has a tradition of bringing into focus the recent advances in ophthalmology. But it seems surprising that one has to go back to 1940 to find a major report on the corneal diseases, when R. Rub­ brecht wrote an "Aperr;u de la pathologie et de la therapeutique generale des maladies de la cornee". However, this omission is only apparent. In fact, many reports, since then, have contributed to our knowledge of the advances in corneal research. The corneal dimensions were documented in "La biometrie ocu­ laire clinique (Y. Delmarcelle et aI., 1976)", the fine structure of the cornea in "L'ultrastructure de tissues oculaires (L. Missotten, 1964)", and many aspects of its metabolism in "Les verres de contact (P. Cochet et ai, 1967)" and "Les complications oculaires des erreurs congenitales du metabolism (J.P. Groux et O. Kallay, 1971)" . Bacterial keratitis was a main topic in "La therapeutique par les antibiotiques autres que la Penicillamine en Ophtalmologie (1. Michiels, 1952). Fungal corneal infections were described in detail in "Les mycoses oculaires" (J . Fran90is et M. Elewaut-Rysselaere, 1968)" and the toxic effects of drugs were dealt with in "Les effets nocifs des medications generales sur I'appareil visuel (J. Michiels et coil. 1972)".

This report for the Belgian Ophthalmological Society concerns a number of fundus diseases, which most ophthalmologists only rarely encounter.

The need to study the corneal complications of measles was not very obvious. Measles is no longer seen in developed countries but will still be encountered in the developing countries.

The text of the book includes a comprehensive review of all aspects of intraocular lens surgery including details of the design, optics chem istry and sterilization of intraocular lenses.