Slit lamp
medical device, microscope with a light source that can be projected into a linear beam
In ophthalmology and optometry, a slit lamp is an instrument used in conjunction with a biomicroscope and consisting of a high-intensity light source that can be focused to shine a thin sheet of light into the eye. The lamp facilitates an examination of the anterior and posterior segment of the human eye, which includes the eyelid, sclera, conjunctiva, iris, natural crystalline lens, and cornea. The binocular slit-lamp examination provides a stereoscopic magnified view of the eye structures in detail, enabling anatomical diagnoses to be made for a variety of eye conditions. A second, hand-held lens is used to examine the retina.
History
Two conflicting trends emerged in the development of the slit lamp. One trend originated from clinical research and aimed to apply the increasingly complex and advanced technology of the time. The second trend originated from ophthalmologic practice and aimed at technical perfection and a restriction to useful methods. The first man credited with developments in this field was Hermann von Helmholtz (1850) when he invented the ophthalmoscope.
In ophthalmology and optometry, the instrument is called a "slit lamp", although it is more correctly called a "slit lamp instrument". Today's instrument is a combination of two separate developments, the corneal microscope and the slit lamp itself.
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This entry incorporates text from “Slit lamp” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.