Articoli Scientifici di Oftalmologia

Argomento : 35

In pursuit of objective dry eye screening clinical techniques

Abstract

Dry eye is a multifactorial, progressive, and chronic disease of the tears and ocular surface. The disease is

multi-factorial and has intermittent symptoms. Discomfort, visual disturbance, tear film instability with potential

damage to the ocular surface, and increased tear film osmolarity are known associates.

Dry eye is a common clinical problem for eye-care providers worldwide and there is a large number of clinical

investigative techniques for the evaluation of dry eye. Despite this, however, there is no globally accepted guideline

for dry eye diagnosis and none of the available tests may hold the title of the ‘gold standard’. The majority of the

techniques involved in the diagnosis of the disease, particularly for its early stages, has a large degree of

subjectivity.

The purpose of this article is to review existing dry eye investigative techniques and to present a new objective dry

eye screening technique based on optical coherence tomography.

Keywords: Dry eye, Shrimer’s test, TBUT test, Inflammation, OCT, Epithelial thickness, Anterior-segment