Posters

The effect of topical insulin for treatment of dry eyes in Sjögren Syndrome

Poster Details

First Author: T.Loureiro PORTUGAL

Co Author(s):    D. Lopes   A. Carreira   F. Moraes   A. Vide Escada   S. Barros   N. Campos     

Abstract Details

Purpose:

To assess the effects of topical insulin 4 times per day for 4 weeks on the symptoms and signs of dry eye patients with Sjögren Syndrome dry eye disease.

Setting:

Single-center prospective study.

Methods:

Sjögren Syndrome patients with dry eye symptoms, not on treatment with artificial tears on the past 36 months were included. The patients were randomly selected to receive a lipid-containing artificial tear (AT) or the same artificial tear with insulin (AT+IT), 4 times per day for a month. Ocular Surface Disease Index (OSDI), Schirmer test (ST), tear break-up time (TBUT) and SICCA-OSS were recorded at the baseline and four weeks after treatment. SBI System “IDRA” was also used to measure lipid layer thickness, noninvasive break-up time (NIBUT) and to perform meibography at the baseline and at the end of follow-up.

Results:

Twenty eyes received AT and twenty eyes received AT+IT. After four weeks of treatment, the majority of patients (80%) reported improvement in their OSDI score but were not significantly better in any group. The SICCA-OSS also improved in the majority of patients, in particular in the AT+IT group (p < 0.05). The lipid layer thickness improved in both groups but the TBUT and NIBUT did not show a statistically significant difference. There were no side effects reported in both groups.

Conclusions:

Our study shows the benefits of treating patients with Sjögren Syndrome with dry eye symptoms. Treatment with AT+TI seems to be a safe and effective option in these patients. Although it did not provide a significant symptomatic subjective improvement as show by OSDI, it had an objective improvement (SICCA-OSS, lipid layer thickness, IDRA parameters) comparing to AT, which should encourage its use in order to reduce ocular surface complications associated with the disease.

Financial Disclosure:

None