onal models of age-related macular degeneration.
It is known that therapeutic development is time consuming (15 years average), expensive, and often met with low success - for every 500 therapeutic interventions which demonstrate positive outcome in animal models, there is one that might translate to humans. This success ratio is often lower for ocular therapeutics owing to the challenges herein. Learning the additional processes involved in taking an idea for an ocular therapy from basic to translational research was fascinating; the patient model and experimental protocols, the study designs and data evaluation, proper reporting – it was very informative to hear first-hand accounts of the impact these aspects had on a study outcome, for better and for worse.
The workshop then brought to a close with awards for posters for Alan Hibbitts of Royal College of Surgeons for his overview of an anti-fibrotic hydrogel designed to treat glaucoma patients, and Marina Zaki of University College Dublin for her work on the state-of-play of EU and FDA regulations for ocular therapeutics.
While this was one of the smallest conferences I’ve attended, it only strengthened my opinion that these intimate gatherings are more often than not the most worthwhile to attend. Attracting leading experts in the field from Brazil, USA, Portugal, Spain, and Sweden to name but a few, I not only got a chance to see them disseminate and discuss their highly impactful, innovative work which is leading ocular research today, but I got ample opportunity to discuss my work with them in great detail, exchange ideas and opinions, and forge new collaborative links for the future.
To give some perspective, this coming week I am presenting my work at XXIII Biennial Meeting of the International Society for Eye Research (ISER); one of the biggest eye and vision research meetings in the world, in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Whilst there, I have scheduled meet-ups with some of the attendees from the ‘New Frontiers in Ocular Therapeutics’ I got the opportunity to interact with at said meeting. In certain instances to discuss collaborations, in others to establish international networks – irrespective of the topic, they are opportunities I otherwise might not have had were it not for my attendance at, and more importantly the nature of, the workshop hosted by the organisers in UCD.
In closing, Prof. Kennedy and Dr. Reynolds, and all associated parties that made the workshop what it was, deserve big plaudits for what ultimately transpired to be an incredibly productive and enjoyable experience, and I would strongly recommend early career researchers target these types of meetings in their own respective fields. Such were the benefits, that in Dr. Reynold’s closing address in which she detailed the future of the workshop and suggested it may change from bi-annual to annual, I couldn’t help but find myself thinking ‘I hope so’.