The Studies of Ocular Complications of AIDS (SOCA) is a collaborative multicenter research effort whose objective is to evaluate strategies for the treatment and prevention of ocular complications associated with AIDS.  SOCA focuses its efforts on cytomegalovirus (CMV) retinitis, as it is the most common ocular opportunistic complication of AIDS.  CMV retinitis progressively destroys retinal tissue resulting in vision loss.  Early treatments slowed progression and in some cases stopped it.  Complex treatment regimens as well as viral resistance have complicated treatment and adversely affected quality of life.  Hence, SOCAs goal is to evaluate new treatments and test therapeutic strategies for CMV retinitis in the hope of prolonging remission periods and preserving vision without decreasing the length or quality of life.  The SOCA research group is committed to developing standards and new methodologies for clinical trials and long term epidemiological investigations of the progression and outcome of ocular complications of AIDS.

SOCA began in 1989 through funding from the National Eye Institute, started enrollment of patients in March of 1990, and completed five clinical trials and a prospective observational cohort study.  The SOCA clinical trials were conducted over a nine year period (1989 through 1998), and were designed to examine the effects of current and emerging treatments for cytomegalovirus retinitis in people with AIDS.  The treatment strategies are summarized in the Design Tables of the SOCA Curriculum Vitae (CV) located on the SOCA webpage: https://jhuccs1.us/soca/lsoca/open/investinfo.htm.

From 1998 through 2013, the Longitudinal Studies of Ocular Complications of AIDS (LSOCA), a long term prospective epidemiological study was designed in the first 10 years to 1) monitor secular trends in the incidence of CMV retinitis and other complications of AIDS, 2) determine the effect of highly active anti-retroviral treatments, or HAART-induced changes in immune status on the risk of CMV retinitis and other complications of AIDS, 3) determine the characteristics (clinical, virologic, hematologic, and biochemical) of populations at high risk for CMV retinitis and other complications of AIDS, and 4) evaluate the effects of treatment for CMV retinitis and other ocular complications on visual function, quality of life and survival.  During the final 6 years (2008 to 2013) the objectives were to evaluate 1) long term outcomes of ocular opportunistic infections (OOIs) among patients with AIDS; 2) visual impairment among patients with AIDS and without OOIs (No OOIs), and 3) host genetic risk factors and immunologic mechanisms of these ocular complications and their outcomes.

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