The editorial staff at Contact Lens Spectrum and Contact Lenses Today would like to extend a joyous holiday greeting to you and yours. We'd also like to thank our editorial staff for all of their efforts as we move forward into the 2013 calendar year. Happy holidays and happy reading.

According to a report published by Bloomberg, Warburg Pincus LLC has hired Goldman Sachs Group Inc. to explore the sale of its Bausch + Lomb Inc. The report states that Warburg may seek at least $10 billion for the company. The same report further states that this month Goldman contacted companies such as Sanofi, GlaxoSmithKline Plc and Merck & Co., and that other companies, such as Abbott Laboratories, also will be contacted.

When CLT contacted B+L for comment, Adam Grossberg, the company's Vice President, Global Communications & Investor Relations, stated "Bausch + Lomb is regularly contacted by companies with strategic interest in our company, and we continue to aspire to a return to the public markets in the future. However, our focus remains on building the best global eye health company and therefore won't comment further."

Alden Optical announced that it has launched a new online NovaKone training and certification process, the first of its "Alden On-Demand" series. The program is now available at www.aldenoptical.com/novakone.

The company will continue to offer NovaKone fitting training during regularly scheduled live webinars as well as one-on-one training at the practitioner's convenience and expects Alden On-Demand to supplement its extensive personal learning opportunities. For more information on NovaKone fitting training, please contact Maggie Walsh, Sr. Product Specialist at mwalsh@aldenoptical.com.

Plan now to attend the Global Specialty Lens Symposium January 24-27, 2013, at the Rio All Suites Hotel and Casino, Las Vegas, Nevada. With an expert international faculty and a CE-accredited agenda, the 2013 GSLS will include a fundamentals pre-conference, insightful presentations by experts in the field, hands-on demonstrations of cutting-edge products, as well as scientific papers and posters and networking opportunities with your colleagues from over 30 different countries.

Look for more detailed information in future issues of Contact Lens Spectrum and online at www.GSLSymposium.com.
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SynergEyes, Inc., manufacturer and marketer of the Duette HD and Duette Multifocal contact lenses, announced that it has launched a Duette Patient Hotline to answer patients' questions 24 hours a day, seven days a week. SynergEyes believes this program will ensure that patients have a positive lens wearing experience and successful outcomes.

The company stated that customer feedback that they want prescribing Duette lenses to be easy led to the creation of the Duette Patient Hotline as a resource for achieving the highest success rate possible and delighting patients without requiring additional effort on the part of the practice.

The Duette Patient Hotline is staffed by certified contact lens fitters who are available around the clock. Patients may call the hotline with questions regarding lens insertion, lens removal, lens care, or any other lens-related topic. Their call will be answered immediately or returned within thirty minutes of a voicemail message. The patient's eye care professional will be notified of any patient contact via e-mail within 24 hours of the call.

These researchers wanted to investigate the impact of myopia and duration of hard contact lens (HCL) wear on the progression of ptosis.

This study involved 194 eyes of 98 patients with either bilateral or unilateral ptosis with long-term HCL wear. The ptosis of each eyelid was classified into 1 of 4 grades (no ptosis, mild, moderate and severe), and the average spherical equivalent refractive error (SERE), patient age and the duration of HCL wear were then examined.

The average SERE (in diopters) in 99 severe eyes was -8.34, in 47 moderate eyes, -6.28, in 37 mild eyes -5.57 and in 11 no ptosis eyes, -4.80, while the average duration of HCL wear (in years) were 34, 30, 29, and 31, respectively. The average SERE was significantly higher in the severe than in the moderate, mild and no ptosis eyelids, and the average duration of HCL wear was significantly longer in the severe than in the moderate and mild ptosis eyelids. Path analysis showed that the severity of ptosis is significantly influenced by SERE, as well as by patient age and the duration of HCL wear.

The researchers concluded that high myopia, patient age and long-term HCL wear are risk factors associated with the progression of ptosis.

Watanabe A, Imai K, Kinoshita S. Impact of high myopia and duration of hard contact lens wear on the progression of ptosis. Jpn J Ophthalmol. 2012 Dec 11. [Epub ahead of print]
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