AOA 2026: Patterns of response to treatment with lifitegrast ophthalmic solution

Anna Tichenor, OD, PhD, FAAO, assistant professor at Indiana University School of Optometry, discussed her poster on treatment response patterns in dry eye disease (DED) patients treated with lifitegrast during AOA’s Optometry’s Meeting 2026. The poster, titled “Patterns of Response to Treatment With Lifitegrast Ophthalmic Solution in Patients With Dry Eye Disease” and named an AOA Top Five Poster for 2026, identified how quickly and how meaningfully patients experience symptom improvement, and which types of symptoms are affected.

Tichenor explained that a key finding of the analysis is the presence of a subset of patients who demonstrate very early response to lifitegrast. Some individuals begin to experience symptom relief as early as 2 weeks after initiating therapy. Importantly, this relief is not marginal: many patients achieve a robust improvement, defined as greater than 60% reduction in their visual analog scale (VAS) scores for eye dryness. She emphasized that this degree of improvement is clinically meaningful in day-to-day practice.

Another central point is that lifitegrast offers multi-symptom relief. Beyond reducing dryness, patients report improvement in foreign body sensation, burning, stinging, and pain. Given that DED is multifactorial and often presents with a broad constellation of symptoms, this broader impact is particularly valuable. Clinicians frequently struggle to match the “right” therapy to the right patient, so understanding which treatments can deliver both early and wide-ranging symptom relief is of high practical relevance.

Tichenor noted that, although this analysis did not identify distinct baseline characteristics that clearly predict who will have the most robust response, the overall response rate is compelling: approximately 75% of patients treated with lifitegrast experienced a substantial reduction in dry eye symptoms over a timeframe ranging from 2 weeks to 84 days. Within that group, about 50% achieved a ≥60% reduction in eye dryness. She underscored that these improvements are not only statistically significant but also clinically meaningful, aligning with both clinician and patient priorities for rapid, substantial, and comprehensive symptom relief in DED management.