This article is more than 5 years old. Information may no longer be current.
Veterans with various comorbidities show increased risk of dry eye syndrome
Am J Ophthalmol. 2011;152(3):377-384.
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts
Dry eye syndrome was prevalent among U.S. military veterans and correlated strongly with post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and other comorbidities, a large study found.
"This suggests that veterans may be uniquely more susceptible to [dry eye syndrome] than the general population, given the comorbidities found in this population of patients," the study authors said.
The retrospective study included 16,862 patients who visited two Veterans Affairs eye clinics during a 5-year interval; 2,056 veterans were diagnosed with dry eye syndrome, and 14,806 veterans had no dry eye.
Study results showed that 12% of male patients and 22% of female patients were diagnosed with dry eye. Female gender correlated significantly with increased risk of dry eye (P < .0001).
Nineteen percent of patients with a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder had a concurrent diagnosis of dry eye, compared with 11% of patients without post-traumatic stress disorder. In addition, 17% of patients with depression and 10% of those without depression had dry eye.
Autoimmune conditions, non-autoimmune arthritis, thyroid disease and sleep apnea also correlated strongly with dry eye syndrome. Twenty-two percent of patients using antihistamines were diagnosed with dry eye, compared with 10% of non-users. Anti-depression medications, anti-anxiety medications and anti-benign prostatic hyperplasia medications were strongly associated with dry eye syndrome.
Limitations of the study included its retrospective design and reliance on International Classification of Diseases codes and medication use to define and exclude dry eye. Future analyses should include environmental factors and dry eye etiology and severity, the authors said.