Our program aims to provide new and better treatments for eye muscle disorders. About 3 percent of children grow up with visual impairment due to a crossed-eye disorder; adults frequently acquire double vision from injury or disease. About 100,000 corrective eye muscle operations are done annually in the U.S. We seek to transfer new information and techniques into practical clinical applications for these patients.

One of our areas of study is the effect of drugs on eye muscles. Botulinum A toxin (Botox) injected into the muscles that move the eye or the eyelid has emerged from our lab as an important treatment for crossed-eye disorders (strabismus), as well as for uncontrolled eye closure (blepharospasm), and for spastic muscle disorders, excess sweating, abnormal stomach anc bladder function, and of course for cosmetic facial lines. Other drugs are under study and development to directly affect the eye muscles upon local injection and to influence the nerves going to the eye. Eye muscles have separate layers. We are in the development phase of using laser techniques to remove these muscle layers selectively to determine the effect on eye alignment and eye movements. This has a good chance of becoming an improved clinical treatment for people suffering from eye muscle disorders. Electrical stimulation to treat weak muscles is an additional topic of study.

For more information, visit Alan Scott's lab web pages.

Collaborators: Joel Miller, David Robins, Otis Paul, Joseph Demer, Ely Almeida Santos, Ethan Rossi