The
A.V.I. Panoramic Viewing System was developed in New York, in 1989 by Avi Grinblat, under the surgical supervision of Professor Stanley Chang, MD. After medical trails performed at the New York Cornell Medical Center and later at Columbia University the System was launched on the market and immediately revolutionized the way of visualizing and performing vitreoretinal surgery. Soon, the A.V.I. Panoramic Viewing System became the standard operating system in eye clinics worldwide.
The A.V.I. Panoramic Viewing System comprises of several elements: a stereo image inverter, 2 wide field, indirect aspheric contact lenses, lens handles, lens retaining ring and wide field illumination that fits through a single 20 gauge sclerotomy.
With the advent of the transparent image inverter and two miniaturized contact lenses a high-resolution view of the entire fundus was made possible. Panoramic views through this system allow the selection of 68-degree field of view up to the equator or a 130-degree field of view up to the ora serrata. Current direct biomicroscopic viewing allows only a 20 or 35-degree field of view. Other wide field systems allow only a 70-degree field of view, which does not offer the precision and higher resolution image of the A.V.I. system. This approach added new dimentions to the surgical capability in complex cases of retinal detachment.