2000

On April 12, 2000, photodynamic therapy (PDT) with verteporfin (Visudyne®) is approved by the FDA for the treatment of neovascular AMD. Developed in the 1990s by Joan W. Miller, MD and Evangelos S. Gragoudas, MD, Visudyne® is the first pharmacologic treatment for retinal disease.

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1926

Frederick H. Verhoeff, MD, Harvard Medical School (HMS) Professor of Ophthalmology and Mass. Eye and Ear's first full-time researcher and pathologist, establishes the first endowed ophthalmic research unit, the Howe Laboratory, at Mass. Eye and Ear.

1947

The world’s first...

1850

Henry Willard Williams, AM, MD, delivers the first course of clinical ophthalmology lectures at Harvard Medical School—the first course of its kind ever given in an American medical school.

1871

Dr. Williams becomes the first Chair of the newly established Harvard...