
The Annual Global Specialty Lens Symposium held last week (January 22-25) in Las Vegas, Nevada included a case report poster presentation in which two current optometry students, Kelly Deering ’20 and Elizabeth Voss ’22 along with current CCL resident, Matthew Lee, OD, and former CCL resident Jonathan Chen, OD, worked with Contact Lens Faculty and Director of Academics, Julie DeKinder, OD on four different case studies.
The three day conference is sponsored by Contact Lens Spectrum, and the GSLS is the leading national contact lens conference in North America with delegates attending from over 35 countries. The conference focuses on the successful management of ocular conditions using today’s specialty contact lenses through continuing education and workshops. Dr. Ed Bennett, Professor Emeritus at UMSL College of Optometry is one of five who plan and execute the program for the Annual GSLS. Bennett along with former CCL resident Dr. Matthew Kauffman were also speakers at this year’s conference.
The poster session consisted of two categories, Research and Case Presentation. The GSLS accepted a total of 128 posters, four of which came from the University of Missouri-St. Louis College of Optometry.
Current students, Kelly Deering, et al (Class of 2020) presented a research poster titled Patients with High Astigmatism Contact Lens Study. Julie DeKinder, O.D. and Elizabeth Voss (class of 2022) presented a research poster titled A Visual Reference to Improve Specialty Lens Fitting Success.
Drs. Johnathan Chen former CCL resident (2018-19) and Julie DeKinder, presented a poster on Feeling that edge, Quadrant Specific Piggybacked GP, and current resident, Drs. Matthew Lee and Julie DeKinder presented a poster on Highly Asymmetric Keratoconus and Optic Neuropathy on Monostotic Fibrous Dysplasia: A case report.
Each of the four posters are featured below.




The University of Missouri-St. Louis and the College of Optometry are a public, four-year land grant institution that focuses on research. The Contact Lens faculty along with residents and current students consistently do various studies and presentations to further advance contact lenses research.
Next year’s conference is scheduled for January 20-23, 2021 at Bally’s in Las Vegas.