News & Events - Eye & Ear Hospital

Trials at the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital of a new medical treatment for the eye condition Keratoconus have had positive early results.
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A dedication to give back to the community was rewarded this month when Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital Frankston Friends member, Natalina Paganoni was awarded the Cadbury Fundraiser Volunteer of the Year Award for Victoria at the Fundraising Institute of Australia’s Victoria Fundraising Excellence Awards.
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Ben and Lochie were both born profoundly deaf - they couldn’t hear and they couldn’t speak. But cochlear implants turned their world around.
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The Cochlear Implant is up there with penicillin, the black box flight recorder and the Hills Hoist as one of Australia’s most well known inventions and this year it will celebrate its 30th Birthday.
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The Chairman of the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital’s Board of Directors, Professor Graeme Ryan, today announced the appointment of Ms Ann Clark as the new Chief Executive Officer.
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Around 300,000 Australians have been diagnosed with Glaucoma but 50 per cent of cases are currently undiagnosed.
Today, March 6 marks the first annual World Glaucoma Day; a joint venture of the World Glaucoma Association and the World Glaucoma Patient Association.
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Rod Saunders was the first person in the world to have a fully implantable, multi-channel, cochlear implant after he lost his hearing in a serious car accident.
Last night he passed away after a long battle with illness.
Rod was the patient of pioneering surgeon scientist Professor Graeme Clark who was working out of the University of Melbourne’s Ear, Nose and Throat Department at the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital.
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World Sight Day (October 11) is an annual event to promote awareness about the prevention and treatment of eye disease. This year’s World Sight Day theme is children’s eye health. Parents are encouraged to have their child’s eyes tested regularly, particularly if there is a history of eye disease in the family or if there is a change in their child’s vision. Read more...

The Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital’s Wagstaff Fellow in Otolaryngology, Dr Bryony Coleman, has been awarded a prestigious Victoria Fellowship.

The Victoria Fellowships were established by the Victorian Government to recognise young researchers with leadership potential and to enhance their future careers, while developing new ideas which could offer commercial benefit to Victoria.

Rare “auditory brain stem implant” brings hope of hearing and speech for toddler

Specialists from the Royal Victorian Eye & Ear Hospital yesterday “switched on” a toddler’s auditory brain stem implant – the last hope of bringing hearing and speech to the profoundly deaf 3-year-old.

On 16 May, Jorja Steele, of Christchurch, New Zealand, became the first child in the Southern Hemisphere to be surgically-implanted with the hearing device, which is based on the concept of a cochlear implant, but directly stimulates the hearing nerve on the brain stem. While this rare operation has been successfully performed on around 30 adults in Australia, this is the first time a child has undergone this procedure outside of Europe. Read more...

Australian first technology: Patients regain their sight better and faster thanks to new transplant operation

A groundbreaking corneal transplant operation performed at the Royal Victorian Eye & Ear Hospital has the potential to help thousands of Australians with corneal blindness regain their sight faster and better than before.

In an Australian first, surgeons at the hospital used new, highly specialised equipment to perform a partial corneal transplantation, removing and replacing only the diseased layer of the cornea, rather than the entire cornea. Read more...

A vision for the future of head and neck cancer treatment was presented at the hospital on Saturday, 12 May in the second Grand Round lecture for 2007.

More than 70 Ear, Nose and Throat (ENT) clinicians, ENT registrars, nurses, pharmacists, medical students and researchers attended to hear Professor Martin Birchall, the Chair of Laryngology of the University of Bristol, England, present. Read more...

A team of Eye & Ear staff recently completed the ultimate test of endurance in an effort to help more children receive the gifts of sight and hearing.

Staff participated in the Murray to Moyne Cycle Relay – an annual event which promotes health and wellbeing while raising funds for Victorian hospitals and health services. With financial support from the community, cycle teams from over 160 health organisations complete an arduous 520km ride over 24 hours.

The Eye & Ear proudly sponsored a team, which consisted of 19 cyclists and 5 support crew, to participate in this year’s event so that 100% of funds raised went directly into kids’ health initiatives at the hospital. Read more...

Bionic eye research trial still some years away

February 2007

A Victorian trial of an artificial retina, developed by the Doheny Eye Institute of the University of Southern California, is at least two to three years away.

As reported in the Sunday Age, 18 February 2007, the Royal Victorian Eye & Ear Hospital has been considered as a research centre for the artificial retina device.

Dr William G Campbell, head of the hospital’s Vitreoretinal Unit, said while the device was an exciting development in the ophthalmological field, it was still in its infancy, and it would be many years before the artificial retina was widely available to the public. Read more...

Diabetes program continues to improve quality of life

January 2006

The Eye & Ear’s Dose Adjustment for Normal Eating (DAFNE) program, now in its third year, continues to change the lives of hospital patients with diabetes. Read more...

After a groundbreaking operation performed by the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital, a 20-month-old toddler from Hoppers Crossing has heard her parents voices for the first time. The toddler, Hayley Walsh, was the first person in Victoria to simultaneously receive two ‘bionic ears’. Read more...

The Royal Victorian Eye & Ear Hospital is pleased to announce the appointment of its new Patron, Mrs Jan de Kretser.

Mrs de Kretser recently accepted an invitation from the Hospital to be Patron during her husband’s term of office as Governor of Victoria.

Professor Graeme Ryan AC, Chair of the Hospital’s Board of Directors, said the Hospital was delighted by Mrs de Kretser’s acceptance. “Mrs de Kretser’s patronage provides a morale boost to Hospital staff and enhances the profile of the Eye & Ear, and its important work, in the Victorian community,” Prof Ryan said.

The Royal Victorian Eye & Ear Hospital is delighted to announce that its contribution to hearing research has been honoured in the 2006 Melbourne Awards.

The Hospital is a member of the East Melbourne Hearing Precinct, which won the Community Organisation award for establishing Melbourne as the centre for excellence in the area of hearing research. The Precinct’s other members include the Department of Otolaryngology and School of Audiology at the University of Melbourne, The Bionic Ear Institute, CRC Hear and Cochlear Limited Melbourne.

A routine eye check-up that doubles as a screening for cardio-vascular disease is the vision Professor Tien Yin Wong holds for the future.

It’s a vision that is supported by the research community, after Prof Wong was recently awarded the 2006 Commonwealth Health Minister’s Award for Excellence in Health and Medical Research.

A new initiative by Guide Dogs Victoria (GDV), which has been launched in association with The Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital, is set to improve the quality of life for many patients with poor eyesight.

The Centre for Vision Independence, which opened in June, is a free, independent advisory service specifically for vision impaired Hospital patients to help them better manage their vision loss.

The Lions Corneal Donation Service, based at The Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital, has launched a new system enabling corneas to be stored at human body temperature levels for up to a month.

Previously, corneas were held at low temperatures and had to be transplanted within one week of donation.

Lions Corneal Donation Service Director, Dr Graeme Pollock, said no other corneal donation facility in Australia offered this kind of service.

Easter eyesight gift something to look forward to

Groundbreaking new Melbourne research could save the eyesight of the thousands of Australians Health Minister Bronwyn Pike announced today.

Ms Pike said the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital had attracted German doctor Christine Wittig to Melbourne to test and trial a revolutionary treatment for the degenerative eye disease Kerataconus. Read more...