The Landscape of NIAID-funded Observational COVID-19 Cohort Studies.

The spread of SARS-CoV-2 since late 2019 represented an unprecedented public health emergency, which included a need to fully understand COVID-19 disease across all ages and populations. In response, the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) rapidly funded epidemiology studies that monitored COVID-19. However, the diversity and breadth of the populations studied in NIAID-funded COVID-19 observational cohorts were not easy to extrapolate because of siloed approaches to collect and report data within NIAID. Here, we describe the effort to develop a harmonized cohort study reporting tool that includes common epidemiological data elements as well as NIAID priorities. We report its implementation to analyze metadata from 58 COVID-19 cohort studies funded February 2020 to June 2021, visualize key metadata including geographic distribution, study duration, participant demographics, sample types collected, and scientific priorities addressed. A bibliographic analysis highlights the scientific publications and citations across these funded studies and demonstrates their enormous impact on the COVID-19 field. These analyses highlight how common data elements and reporting tools can assist funding agencies to capture the landscape and potential gaps during public health responses and how they can assist in decision making.

Fluorescein angiography in the differential diagnosis of sclerokeratitis.

Anterior segment fluorescein angiography has been used in the investigation of patients with sclerokeratitis. This showed that corneal thinning or destruction was associated with non-perfusion of the episcleral vasculature. The changes arose either as a result of a systemic vasculitis in seropositive individuals or were induced by surgery to the eye. Infiltrative forms of sclerokeratitis were commoner in seronegative patients and were less often associated with vascular shutdown.

Aphakic retinal detachment.

A study of 132 cases of aphakic retinal detachment (ARD) following mainly intracapsular cataract surgery has been made. Forty-nine cases (37%) were found to have vitreous incarcerated into the cataract section out of a total of 54 (41%) cases who had suffered a vitreous complication during cataract surgery. A study of the characteristics of ARD reveals that those cases having had a vitreous complication in the management of their cataracts are more likely to develop detachment within three months than those not suffering from such a complication. The occurrence of these early post-extraction retinal detachments is not influenced by the presence of underlying axial myopia. When we compared ARD in patients whose cataract extractions had been complicated by vitreous incarceration with those ARDs following uncomplicated cataract surgery, we found that the characteristics of the detachments were very similar. Thus distribution of underlying myopia, extent of detachment, length of time of detachment, and multiplicity and type of retinal holes were generally similar. However, ARD following complicated cataract surgery is more likely to suffer from periretinal fibrosis. The findings confirmed the risk of ARD following complicated intracapsular cataract surgery and support the tendency to perform the extracapsular operation.

Acquired Brown's syndrome: an unusual cause.

A 62-year-old man with acquired Brown's syndrome is presented. This was due to an orbital metastatic deposit, a cause not previously reported. Other causes of this disorder and its treatment are discussed.

The detection of Chlamydia trachomatis by direct immunofluorescence in conjunctival smears from patients with trachoma and patients with ophthalmia neonatorum using a conjugated monoclonal antibody.

Duplicate specimens were taken with cotton-wool swabs from the upper tarsal conjunctiva of 63 patients living in Gambian villages in which trachoma is endemic and from 34 infants with ophthalmia neonatorum (ON) attending an outpatient clinic in The Gambia. The detection of Chlamydia trachomatis by direct immunofluorescence (IF) using a conjugated monoclonal antibody to its principal outer membrane protein was compared with isolation in cycloheximide-treated McCoy cells. For trachoma, the sensitivity and specificity of the immunofluorescent technique were 62% and 100% respectively if ten elementary bodies (EBs) was taken as the minimum requirement for positivity by IF. If all cases with one or more EB were considered positive, the sensitivity was 81% and the specificity 85%. For ON the sensitivity and specificity were 100% and 95% respectively, regardless of which criterion was used. In view of its simplicity and easy applicability to field conditions it seems likely that direct IF using monoclonal antibodies may be a useful technique for the detection of C. trachomatis in the conjunctival epithelium of patients with trachoma.