DR. JOSEPH DELLO RUSSO

It is commonly believed that cataracts are treated (about three million procedures in the U.S. per year) with a laser device. Eye surgeons around the world need to spend a lot of time while counseling with patient who are about to undergo cataract surgery to explain it is currently not performed using a laser. But that may soon change since a new laser device shows promising results in this treatment. The beleaguered surgeon can then reassure his patients that they are being treated with a laser, which they have always presumed anyway.
 
There are 3 start-up laser companies who are working on laser technology that can treat cataracts. Dr. Joseph Dello Russo,who was part of the original team of doctors who performed the clinical trials of laser eye surgery, is affiliated with one of these companies, LenSar, who presented results from clinical trials on 10/24/2009 at the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO) annual meeting in San Francisco. The new laser has also been recently mentioned in professional publications (Journal of cataract and refractive surgery, September 2009).
 
Currently, doctors are using a device created in the mid 1970′s by famous eye surgeon Dr. Charles Kelman. While sitting in a dental chair having his teeth cleaned he realized that the sonic dental cleaner is able not only to clean the tar between the teeth but also to dissolve cataract, a milky growth on the lens of the eye. At least that is how he related to his epiphany, afterwhich he shouted “eureka! a safer way to cure my patients’ cataracts”. As they say the rest is history so humorously related by him in his memoirs “I DID IT MY WAY”. It would take another ten years for him to perfect the device and for it to become the standard of cataract surgery for the entire world. Who knows if he ever thought that his “eureka” moment would be heard forever and everywhere on the planet?
 
But Charlie was a bit of a devil, he was. Since the device would dissolve the lens he gave it in greek name “phacoemulsifier” (lens dissolver). Although the name had a scientific as well as some “snob appeal”, it did not easily flow off one’s tongue. Not to be deterred from doing it his way, Charlie later explained that it was “like a laser”. Lasers at the time were very new to medicine. And so cataracts were eventually explained by frustrated surgeons as being treated with a laser: “yes, yes, of course I will be using my laser on your cataract”, since prospective patients just knew that their friends had their cataracts removed by laser.
 
In 2000, Dr. Dello Russo invested in a new type of laser that would replace the blade used in lasik which was very new at the time. Dr. Dello Russo was intrigued by a start-up company known as INTRALASE, operating out of San Diego, California. Not only did he lend money to keep the company afloat for most of that year but he also ordered the very first two successful commercial lasers that were fabricated and sent to his offices in 2002.
 
Dello Russo has been first in recognizing emerging ophthalmic technologies. He admits to buying the first laser to be used for lasik in 1989, the first to buy the very first two Intralase lasers, the first to recognize an advance in lasik laser technology, known as the ATC laser (created by the same scientist, Ramndy Frey, Ph.D.) He admits to quite a few other “firsts”, but he says that is what added so much fun to his career: “I always kept my nose to the ground sniffing out what new device might be out there, start-ups needing a little extra push by the likes of me.” Finding a possible new emerging technology, latching onto it and then helping to launch it for the benefit of the world’s patients. 
 
Back to 2004. LenSar was formed that year by scientist Randy Frey, Ph.D., Dr. Joseph Dello Russo, as well as a special team of proven professionals. The same wavelenght laser used in Intralase devices was utilized by Randy Frey to alter the nature lens of the eye. Creating a company with four walls and dedicated staff took up the first year of LenSar. Experiments with dead animal eyes were to soon follow. About two years ago human eyes were safely but partially treated with the laser outside the U.S. After about 100 eye treatment, the research seems to be positive. We are still very far from a proven commercial product but we are likewise reassured that our studies have some merit since two other companies have followed our course.
 
So hopefully surgeons will soon feel confident to tell their patients “well, of course I will be using my safe and precise laser to take care of your cataract”!