Friday Video; If I Had Dry Eyes....

Friday If I Had.......
Once a week the blog will post a video from Insidermedicine's series deemed "If I Had." These videos cover numerous disorders and diseases.

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,Sjogren's Syndrome (SS), an autoimmune disease characterized by dry eyes and dry mouth has been found in some studies to be more common in HCV infected patients. They differ from primary SS in that they do not have lung and kidney involvment

Todays Topic

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If I Had; Dry Eye -

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Dr. Reza Dana, MD, MSc, MPH, Massachusetts Eye & Ear Infirmary and Harvard Medical School

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Evaluation of ocular surface damage and dry eye status in chronic hepatitis C at different stages of hepatic fibrosis.

Gumus K, Yurci A, Mirza E, Arda H, Oner A, Topaktas D, Karakucuk S.
Department of Ophthalmology, Division of Gastroenterology, Erciyes University School of Medicine, Kayseri 38039, Turkey. drkorayg@hotmail.com 2009

Abstract
PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to explore changes in ocular surface and tear function parameters in chronic hepatitis C at different stages of hepatic fibrosis.

METHODS: Fifty-four patients with biopsy-proven chronic hepatitis C and 54 age- and sex-matched healthy control subjects without systemic hepatitis C infection were examined with the Ocular Surface Disease Index questionnaire, Schirmer with and without anesthesia, tear film breakup time, and scoring of ocular surface Lissamine green staining using modified Oxford and van Bijsterveld scoring systems and corneal fluorescein staining.

RESULTS: Patients with chronic hepatitis C scored significantly worse than the control subjects on all parameters: modified Oxford scores of Lissamine green staining (5.5/3.0; P less then 0.001), Oxford and van Bijsterveld scores (4.0/2.0; P less then 0.001), and corneal fluorescein staining (1.5/0.0; P = 0.001).

The chronic hepatitis C group also had higher Ocular Surface Disease Index scores than the control subjects (22.3/13.7; P = 0.001). Schirmer with and without anesthesia and tear film breakup time scores were found to be lower in patients with chronic hepatitis C (P less then 0.001). Moreover, patients with advanced stages of hepatic fibrosis (stages 4-6) had significantly lower values of tear film breakup time and worse Ocular Surface Disease Index scores and ocular surface vital dye staining than those with initial stages of hepatic fibrosis (stages 0-3).

CONCLUSION: Patients with chronic hepatitis C, especially those with advanced stages of hepatic fibrosis, were more likely to exhibit severe ocular surface damage and signs of dry eye.
PMID: 19724213 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]