Infectious keratitis is a leading cause of visual morbidity, including blindness, all across the globe, especially in developing countries. Prompt and adequate treatment is mandatory to maintain corneal integrity and to recover the best possible final visual acuity. Although in most of the cases practitioners chose to employ empirical broad-spectrum antimicrobial medication that is usually effective, in some instances, they face the need to identify the causative agent to establish the appropriate therapy. An extensive search was conducted on published literature before December 2020 concerning the main laboratory investigations used to identify the microbial agents found in infectious keratitis, their indications, advantages, and disadvantages, as well as the results reported by other studies concerning different diagnostic tools. At present, the gold standard for diagnosis is still considered to be the isolation of microorganisms in cultures, along with the examination of smears, but other newer techniques, such as polymerase chain reaction (PCR), next-generation sequencing (NGS), and in vivo confocal microscopy (IVCM) have gained popularity in the last decades. Currently, these newer methods have proved to be valuable adjuvants in making the diagnosis, but technological advances hold promise that, in the future, these methods will have increased performance and availability, and may become the new gold standard, replacing the classic cultures and smears. Contents 1. Introduction 2. Corneal scraping, smears, and cultures 3. Corneal biopsy and histopathological examination 4. Molecular assays: Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and next-generation sequencing (NGS) 5. In vivo confocal microscopy (IVCM) 6. Conclusions
We present the case of a 12-year-old boy with bilateral papilledema, relating moderate symptomatology and without an important medical history. Ophthalmological examination revealed a significant alteration of visual acuity, an important papilledema and macular edema in both eyes. Further investigations excluded infectious and autoimmune diseases, intracranial masses and congenital affliction. Because of an elevated opening pressure in lumbar puncture procedure, the diagnosis of intracranial hypertension was confirmed. After two weeks of treatment with corticosteroids, carbonic anhydrase inhibitor and hyperosmotic drug, the patient had an important structural and functional ophthalmological improvement.
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