Editorial foreword.

Welcome to the second edition of Clinical Ophthalmology of 2008. Whether you are reading the journal online or in print, I hope you enjoy this edition. If you are looking for the latest articles ‘hot off the press’ then go to our ‘Online Early’ section (http://dovepress.com/articles.php?issue_id=134) where you will find articles published in the last few weeks. One of the many benefits of electronic publishing is its immediacy of available material and without doubt this is the reason electronic publication will increasingly dominate traditional publishing.

Amongst many excellent papers, we have three on pegaptanib sodium treatment of neovascular age-related macular degeneration (ARMD) (Feucht et al 2008; Sivaprasad 2008; Sivaprasad et al 2008), each giving an insight into the uses of the treatment from the perspective of the practitioner’s country of origin. We have further insights into ARMD from papers by Cummings and Cunha-Vaz (2008) and Emerson and Lauer (2008). This apparent dominance of this edition by ARMD is perhaps a marker of the amount of research that is currently going on in this clinical speciality. I would doubt that 10 years ago we would have been carrying so many papers in this area.

But of course, we have a number of other high-quality papers not related to ARMD. Bashshur and colleagues (2008) discuss the thorny issue of Intravitreal triamcinolone, which continues to tax the skills of glaucoma surgeons. Fea and colleagues (2008) describe the results of a Phase II clinical study of a potentially exciting new intraocular pressure-lowering laser system: micropulse diode laser trabeculoplasty. Thought provoking papers come from Varner (2008) discussing potential bias in ophthalmic pharmaceutical clinical trials and Chang and Sarraf (2008) look at current and future approaches in the prevention and treatment of diabetic retinopathy. As usual we have a number of case reports such as ‘Epstein-Barr virus and acute retinal necrosis in a 5-year-old immunocompetent child’ by Gallego-Pinazo and colleagues (2008) and ‘Bilateral permanent concentric visual field defect secondary to severe pre-eclampsia’ from Citirik and colleagues (2008). Finally you will notice our correspondence section. Please feel free to contribute letters if any of the papers in the current (or any edition) stir you.

If none of these current articles grabs your attention then Clinical Ophthalmology has much more to offer. As mentioned earlier, you can look at the recently published papers online. If you are new to the journal and wish to see what we have published in past editions you can view this material by clicking on the ‘Table of Contents’ button on the Clinical Ophthalmology homepage.