Crossover clinical trial of pain relief in cataract surgery.

PURPOSE: To determine the effects of intra-operative Korean traditional music on pain experienced by Korean patients undergoing sequential bilateral cataract surgery. METHODS: This was a two-sequence, two-period, and two-treatment crossover study. Fifty-two patients with cataracts were divided into two groups by block randomization, and bilateral cataract surgery was performed. In group 1, patients listened to Korean traditional music (KTM) during their first but not second cataract surgery. This sequence was reversed for patients in group 2. After each surgery, patients scored their pain intensity (PI) using a visual analog scale (VAS) ranging from 0 to 10, where 0 was 'no pain' and 10 was 'unbearable pain.' RESULT: There was a statistically significant reduction in the mean VAS score with KTM (3.1 ± 2.0) compared to that without KTM (4.1 ± 2.2; p = 0.013). However, there were no statistically significant differences in blood pressure or pulse rates. CONCLUSION: KTM had a significant effect on reducing pain experienced by patients during cataract surgery. This may be useful in the context of other surgical procedures to reduce pain in Korean patients.

Topographical Analysis of Non-Glaucomatous Myopic Optic Discs Using a Confocal Scanning Laser Ophthalmoscope (TopSS).

OBJECTIVES: To show normative data of optic discs and the mechanism of glaucoma in people with myopia. DESIGN: Cross-sectional study. PARTICIPANTS: This study investigated 89 Korean adults with myopia but without glaucoma. METHODS: Patients were divided into three groups according to the refractive error: low, moderate, and high; and axial length: normal or below normal length, moderately long, and extremely long. Optic disc variables were obtained by confocal scanning laser ophthalmoscope and compared among groups. RESULTS: The optic disc parameters have a correlation between the refractive error and the optic disc parameters such as average depth, volume below, and half-depth volume. Those parameters also decreased as the axial length increased. The thickness of the volume above decreased significantly as the axial length increased, but a similar relationship was not evident with the refractive error change. In addition, the optic disc parameters were analyzed with respect to the 12 clockwise directions. CONCLUSIONS: Analyses of optic disc parameters provided by TopSS™ revealed the height of the disc decreased as the myopic refractive error and/or axial length increased. The RNFL bundle became compacted in the thinner disc of the myopic population. This could be an explanation for the fragility of the RNFL in the myopic population. The 12 radial section analyses revealed the shallow cupping at the temporal side in the high-myopic, very-long-axis group. The neuroretinal rim (NRR) height significantly decreased at the superior and inferior sides. These findings suggest that the RNFL bundle should be under high mechanical strain in these sectors.