Jod Mehta’s journey in ophthalmology, the scientific study of eyes and their diseases, began as a young man in medical school. Faced with the decision of which branch to specialize in, he was convinced by witnessing firsthand the power of ophthalmology to change lives.
“When I was a student watching my first cataract procedures, it was amazing to see the patients the next day,” he says. “The quality of life effect on the individual was huge.”
So began a distinguished career that has today led him to the position of Executive Director of the Singapore Eye Research Institute (SERI), Singapore’s national center for ophthalmic research.
Since its founding in 1997, SERI’s research projects have paved the way for medical innovations that have improved eye health across the globe.
“There’s been lots of innovations in ophthalmology, and there’s been lots of firsts compared to other fields in medicine as well,” Mehta says.
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“The key thing in our sphere of healthcare is that you’ve got to be innovative. Even if you’re at the top of the field, you’ve got to keep on reinventing yourself because staying still is not an option.”
Mehta explains that although there is often a very reasonable explanation for inertia, the way forward lies in finding a balance.
“As a community, we are generally slow to take on some of the innovation because we always worry about safety. Nobody wants the patient to have a bad outcome,” he points out.
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“Some areas have a very limited scope for innovation. So as well as innovating quickly, you need to ask the right questions about where the innovation has to take place.”
During his time practicing in the field, significant breakthroughs have been made, transforming patient outcomes.
“One area that has changed dramatically in corneal transplantation is recovery time,” he says. “Back in 2007, we were doing full-thickness transplants that used to take nine months for patients to see well.
“The innovation of the surgery has improved to such a level now that, within one month, patients can see pretty well. So you can imagine for that individual undergoing the procedure, they’re able to get back to their daily lives much faster than before, which has a huge impact on their quality of life.”
Among the big achievements contributed by SERI is the development of the medication atropine, which stops the progression of myopia (nearsightedness) in children.
“Low-dose atropine came out through trials that were done here almost a decade ago,” Mehta says. “That product has since been commercialized, and there have been many spin-off products that are now being used to treat a significant number of people.”
Looking forward, he sees breakthroughs in technology contributing to improvements in healthcare outcomes, in part thanks to the emergent possibilities of AI.
“AI software is now being used for diabetic screening,” he says. “We know the longer the duration of the diabetes, the higher the risk of retinopathy as well.”
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Part of the solution, Mehta explains, could be in our pockets.
“With phones today, the image resolution is unbelievable. Just recently, I was amazed by how easily I could make a diagnosis from the quality of an imaging shot taken with a standard phone,” he says.
“You can then take that image and run it through a simple AI software program to tell you if there is diabetes and if this patient needs to be referred. You can do simple screening that would eliminate a lot of patients and save a lot of time for a lot of doctors.”
This simple method could have a remarkable effect on public health, Mehta adds.
“The impact would be twofold. One, we will be picking up cases earlier that actually need referral. And two, you’ll be providing a better level of care for the people who need the care,” he says.
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SERI is not unique in drawing huge benefits from its relationships with key partners, with Mehta highlighting the need for global collaboration in order to optimize for different localities.
“Research is a very collaborative business,” he confirms. “Just because something may work for me in Singapore, with a primarily ethnically Chinese population, it may not work with, say, an Indian population in India or with a Caucasian population in Australia or northern Europe.
“And likewise, technologies developed in Europe or in North America may not work in our local population in Asia. So reproducibility, making slight adjustments and tweaking optimization for different populations are really important.”
To this end, SERI has established an extensive network of strategic partners – including Bausch & Lomb, Carl Zeiss, Santen, Ziemer Ophthalmic Systems and Teleon Surgical – which align with its objective of improving medical outcomes for patients across the globe.
And Mehta affirms that ensuring SERI’s scientific breakthroughs are having an impact on patients has been his core focus as Executive Director and will remain so.
“In my tenure, we are very much focused on taking our lab-based innovations or innovations that have been done at a preclinical phase to patients. So making that jump from our labs to our clinics,” he says.
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“Again, patient safety is paramount, but as a clinician, it’s a very exciting phase to be in because you’re seeing new innovation coming through to the patients.
“At the end of the day, that’s why we do the research in the first place, because you want to see the innovation going to individual patients and actually making a difference to that patient’s life.”
