Dry Eye

Our understanding of dry eye and ocular surface disease is expanding at exponential rates. This is allowing us to more accurately diagnose specific forms of dry eye and determine their root causes.

There are lots of parameters to choose from when looking for dry eye disease.

I get to spend a lot of time in OD practices talking about dry eye disease (DED). Many of these practices already do a lot for their dry eye patients, but many seem to fall into one camp or the other.

The mainstay of our therapy today consists of artificial tear preparations, surfactant lid cleansers, warm compresses for the eyelids, and the occasional antibiotic solution or ointment-this is the exact same therapy that was in vogue for treating OSD 25 years ago!

Midway through my education at University of California in San Diego, I was meeting with guidance counselors about what type of medical field I might like, and I hadn’t decided.

Since I read Dr. Robert Latkany’s study on nocturnal lagophthalmos in 2006,1 I am perpetually on the lookout for it, especially in the patients who present with dry eye symptoms. Sometimes it’s easy to spot lagophthalmos-sometimes, if you ask your patient about lid closure, they will report to you that they know about their incomplete lid closure, mostly when they sleep.

Are you providing the highest level of care for your dry eye patients? Testing with all the latest methods, osmolarity, MMP-9, TearScience’s LipiView, to name a few? Treating will a full armamentarium, specialized artificial tears, hot compresses, cyclosporine, steroids, punctual plugs, and more?

In my practice, we screen patients age 25 and over. This is a relatively arbitrary number, but I wanted to skew younger. We often think of dry eye disease as being an older person’s disease. There are a number of reasons why I decided to look at younger patients.

Before recommending laser vision correction for your patient, there are a number of factors you as an eyecare practitioner must consider.

In lieu of improving diagnostic tests, symptoms have been shown to be more repeatable than clinical findings.

It’s sort of funny-one of my childhood recollections is a discussion with my mother (the PhD in organic chemistry) regarding the virtues of Phisohex (hexaclorrphene, Septisol), a facial cleaner. “Phisohex is pH balanced,” she said, “so it is better for your skin.” At the time, the pH comment wasn’t important to me. What was important was that my mother said I should use it, and therefore the characteristic 1970s green bottle of Phisohex was standard at each sink in our home.

Our editorial advisory board looks back on the top five dry eye stories of the year and discusses why these stories were important to optometry in 2014.

Seems like everyone is focusing on baby boomers as they enter a new phase of their lives, but vision in particular is a big topic. And why wouldn’t it be? What is more critical to healthy aging than maintaining healthy vision?

“The future is as bright as it’s ever been as a combined company-we’ll have an incredible amount of resources,” says Actavis CEO Brett Saunders. Saunders, Allergan CEO David Pyott, spoke exclusively with Optometry Times about the Allergan acquisition.

TearLab recently announced that preliminary results of the TearLab Cataract Study, which evaluated the relationship of a hyperosmolar tear film on keratometry readings.

The Brien Holden Institute recently announced it had developed a software program that can automatically assess damage to epithelial cells at the upper eyelid margin.

Novaliq GmbH recently reported positive Phase 1 results with its cyclosporin solution eye drop formulation in clinical development for patients with dry eye.

In his second installment for his Optometry Times blog, The Schachter Factor, Dr. Scott Schachter discusses his protocol for diagnosing and treating dry eye patients in his practice.

TearLab recently reported interim results of a multi-center dry eye disease (DED) prevalence study carried out in the UK at four National Health Service (NHS) hospitals.

Everything from our high-tech lifestyles outdoor environmental factors, and the general aging of the population can lead to blepharitis, dry eye disease (DED) and meibomian gland dysfunction (MGD). Sustained tasks, such as reading, can reduce the blink rate to as low as five blinks per minute. This slow blink rate can cause additional stress on an ocular surface that is already compromised due to one of the aforementioned disorders.

Lupus, dry mouth, and arthritis aren’t usually associated with optometry, but it may well need to become a necessary part of any optometrist's knowledge base as awareness of Sjögren's syndrome becomes more prevalent, reported Dr. Milton M. Hom, OD, FAAO, at his most recent seminar at Vision Expo West.

In an ongoing effort to ameliorate the discomfort and blurred vision that stems from dry eye, tear substitutes have undergone numerous improvements to enhance their efficacy and safety to the ocular surface.

In this video, Dr. Scott Schachter discusses creating a dry eye center.

Every optometrist who fits contact lenses knows what a problem many patients have with contact lens discomfort. It is likewise a significant clinical challenge.

Approaching dry eye from a systemic standpoint can potentially benefit patients in the long term and improve the quality of care we provide. Here are a few key considerations that should be made when assessing dry eye as a potential systemic symptom.