Keith Barton
The Power List 2018
Keith Barton
Consultant Ophthalmologist and Director of The Glaucoma Service, Moorfields Eye Hospital, London, UK
Keith’s principal interests are the surgical management of glaucoma (especially with aqueous shunt devices and MIGS approaches) and secondary glaucomas – Keith runs an NHS clinic at Moorfields that’s uniquely dedicated to the management of glaucoma in uveitis. However, Keith’s skillset goes beyond surgery. He’s well known for organizing and running glaucoma educational symposia that have attracted significant acclaim, and he famously co-founded and organized (with Kuldev Singh [qv]) the Ophthalmology Futures Forum investor networking events that take place in both Europe and Asia.
What have been your career highlights?
“Being asked to manage the glaucoma in patients attending Moorfields’ burgeoning uveitis clinics. I had an instant referral base of largely young patients who virtually all required surgery. In 1999, convincing Pharmacia to bring the Baerveldt Glaucoma Implant to the UK and finally having access to something that could control the IOP with a high level of efficacy in complex surgical glaucoma. Before this, my clinic had become a “bleb-repair shop” with endless streams of patients coming back over and over again for more and more trabeculectomy bleb fiddlings, revisions, repairs, and so on. Participating in the TVT, ABC and PTVT studies and thereby contributing to a firm evidence base for the role of aqueous shunts in glaucoma surgery. Involvement in the MIGS boom. Watching the unexciting field of glaucoma surgery in which I have toiled for years, suddenly become hot and sexy with the current feeding frenzy of commercial interest.”
From Fort Launderdale to the Future