PROGRESSION OF NUCLEAR DENSITY OVER A 10-YEAR INTERVAL

描述：(申请人摘要)核硬化症及其临床 重要的表现为核性白内障，是一种常见的老年性眼病 有问题。在威斯康星州的海狸大坝，核性白内障是最常见的 白内障类型优先于晶状体摘除，而年龄和女性为 与风险增加相关的其他因素已经被发现，还有其他， 假设也与风险有关，有些是肯定的，有些是 消极的。目前许多核硬化症的流行病学研究都使用SILT 记录严重程度的灯照片，并与照片进行比较 分配严重级别的标准。所产生的职系，虽然一般而言 按严重程度排序，是关于重复掩码评分的变量 相同的，由不同的年级学生。因此，风险或保护因素的影响， 这可能是小到中等，可能会被遗漏。我们已经开发出一种 反映核密度的半自动核密度测量方案 硬化症，来自之前收集的照片。该方法反映了当前 排序严重程度的手动评分方案，但重复性很高。我们 建议将这些方法应用于三次以上拍摄的狭缝灯照片 参加海狸水坝眼的大队列中的十年间隔 学习。这将使核硬化的定量在一个更可靠的 与目前的人工评分相比，评分方式更合理，评分范围更广。我们建议 检查先前假设的风险和保护之间的关系 基线水平核硬化症流行严重程度的因素及其影响因素 进展，并估计核密度与测量的关联 视觉功能。开发和测试这些程序的优势 在海狸水坝眼睛研究中发现：(1)数据来自自由生活， 谱性核硬化症可能发生的未选定人群 在其他类似社区中代表这一点，以及(2)照片在手中 因此，该项目是经济的。所描述的方法将在 正在进行的临床试验，其他已经完成的临床试验，以及 其他由国家眼科研究所和其他组织计划的 发现轻微到中度影响将通过更可靠的衡量标准来增强 疾病。

DESCRIPTION: (Applicant's Abstract) Nuclear sclerosis, and its clinically important manifestation as nuclear cataract, is a common age-related ocular problem. In Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, nuclear cataract was the most common cataract type to precede lens extraction While older age and female gender are associated with increased risk, other factors have been found and still other, hypothesized to also be associated with risk, some positively and others negatively. Many current epidemiologic studies of nuclear sclerosis use slit lamp photographs to document severity and compare these with photographic standards to assign severity levels. The resultant grades, while in general ordered as to severity, are variable regarding repeat masked gradings by the same and by different graders. Thus, effects of risk or protective factor, which may be small to moderate, may be missed. We have developed a semi-automated scheme for measuring nuclear density, a reflection of nuclear sclerosis, from previously collected photographs. The method reflects current manual grading schemes in ordering severity, but is highly reproducible. We propose to apply these methods to slit lamp photographs taken three times over a ten-year interval in the large cohort participating in the Beaver Dam Eye Study. This will permit quantitation of nuclear sclerosis in a more reliable manner and on a finer scale than with current manual grading. We propose to examine relationships between previously hypothesized risk and protective factors for prevalent severity of nuclear sclerosis at baseline and for its progression, and to estimate the association of nuclear density with measures of visual function. The advantages of developing and testing these procedures in the Beaver Dam Eye Study are that (1) the data are from a free-living, unselected population in which the spectrum nuclear sclerosis is likely to represent that in other similar communities and (2) the photographs are in hand and thus the project is economical. The approach described will be important in clinical trials that are ongoing, others that have been completed, and still others that are planned by the National Eye Institute and other groups in which finding small to moderate affects will be enhanced by more reliable measures of disease.