Feline Eosinophilic Keratitis—A Review

Eosinophilic keratitis is a disease occurring in cats, horses and rabbits. Its clinical signs include blepharo-spasm, discharge, chemosis, conjunctival hyperaemia and the presence of corneal ulceration. The typical signs of the disease are white to pink plaques on the cornea accompanied with keratitis. The diagnosis of the disease has to be confirmed with cytology examination and the presence of eosinophils and mast cells in the specimen. Local application of corticosteroids and cyclosporine has good therapeutic effect and has been recommended in all affected species. In samples collected from cats, the presence of feline herpes virus DNA has been reported. Eosinophilic keratitis might be caused by an aberrant immune response or reaction to unknown allergic stimuli. The primary cause of the disease is currently unknown.

Prospective, Randomised, Double-Masked Comparison of 0.1% Tacrolimus Ointment and 0.2% Olopatadine Eye Drops in the Treatment of Refractory Allergic Conjunctivitis

Purpose- To analyse and compare the outcomes of topical tacrolimus 0.1% and 0.2 % olopatadine eye drops in refractory allergic conjunctivitis.Methods-Prospective, double masked, randomized control trial conducted from January to December 2015 at a tertiary eye care centre with a follow up of 3 months. A total of 100 patients were enrolled. Fifty patients were allocated into the tacrolimus group (Group A) and olopatadine group (Group B) each. Detailed demographics, systemic history, uncorrected, best corrected visual acuity, intraocular pressure (IOP), anterior and posterior segment findings were recorded. Subjective symptoms and objective signs were recorded in the data forms at baseline and 1, 4, 8 & 12 weeks. The score of the worse eye was considered for analysis. On follow up, vision, IOP, side effects, objective signs and symptoms were recorded.Results- Out of 100 patients, 4 were lost to follow up. The mean age in Group A was 18.63 ± 7.89 years and Group B was 17.21 ± 9.17 years. The M:F ratio was 1.5:1. Among 96 patients, 6 (6.66%) had allergic rhinitis and 3 (3.33%) were asthmatic. The mean sign score, symptom score, giant papillae score, palpebral conjunctival hyperaemia and bulbar conjunctival hyperaemia score was statistically significant between two groups. In Group A, 22.9% patients had punctate epithelial erosions while none had in Group B at 1 month follow up.Conclusion- Topical tacrolimus 0.1% is safe and effective with minimal side effects. It should be considered for patients refractory to conventional treatment or requiring long term treatment, to avoid steroid related complications.

A prospective comparative study to evaluate the efficacy and safety of olopatadine eye drops and bepotastine eye drops in subjects of vernal kerato conjunctivitis

Background: Vernal keratoconjunctivitis (VKC) is an allergic eye disease that especially affects young boys. Both olopatadine and bepotestine are dual acting drugs that provide rapid symptomatic relief coupled with the long-term disease-modifying benefit. The present study is conducted to compare the efficacy and safety of olopatadine eye drops and bepotastine eye drops in patients of vernal keratoconjunctivitis.Methods: A prospective, randomized, parallel-group, comparative study is conducted over a period of 4 weeks on paediatric patients with VKC. 50 patients are recruited and randomized into two treatment groups. They received the assigned drugs for 4 weeks and are called for follow up at the end of 1st week, 4th week and 12th week. At each follow-up, patients are examined and the clinical parameters are graded.Results: This study shows that both olopatadine and bepotastine are equally efficacious. Bepotastine provided quicker relief to symptoms of watering, ocular discomfort and conjunctival hyperaemia. Number of responders are also more in the bepotastine group. Absolute eosinophilic count improved with both the drugs but there is no statistically significant difference between them. Both drugs showed good safety profile. However, 24% patients reported aversion to bitter taste with bepotastine. There is no treatment related severe adverse effects in both the groups.Conclusions: Both olopatadine and bepotastine are effective in treating vernal keratoconjunctivitis. However, bepotastine performed better in reducing tearing, ocular discomfort and conjunctival hyperaemia.

Selective laser trabeculoplasty versus topical medication as initial glaucoma treatment: the glaucoma initial treatment study randomised clinical trial

Background/AimsTo determine if selective laser trabeculoplasty (SLT) is superior to topical medication as a first-line treatment for glaucoma on quality of life (QoL) and clinical outcomes.MethodsIn this international, longitudinal, multisite randomised controlled trial, treatment naïve mild-to-moderate primary open angle or exfoliation glaucoma patients were randomised 1:1 to SLT or topical medication. Glaucoma-specific QoL (primary outcome) was measured using the Glaucoma Outcomes Assessment Tool (GOAT; 342 items, 12 domains). Secondary outcomes included rate of successful intraocular pressure (IOP) reduction (>25% reduction from baseline) and presence of ocular surface disease including conjunctival hyperaemia and eyelid erythema. Our intention-to-treat analysis was performed at months 12 and 24.ResultsOf 167 enrolled patients, 83 and 84 were randomised to SLT and topical medication, respectively; and 145 (n=75 SLT, n=70 medication) completed 24-month follow-up. While both treatment arms achieved significant within-group gains in GOAT outcomes at both endpoints, SLT patients reported a greater between-group improvement in ‘social well-being’ compared with medication patients (mean±SE=0.28±0.13; p=0.034) at 24 months. At month 24, the rate of successful IOP reduction was 18.6% (95% CI 3.0% to 34.3%, p=0.022) higher (absolute difference) in the medication compared with SLT group. More individuals in the medication group had conjunctival hyperaemia and eyelid erythema compared with SLT at 24 months.ConclusionOverall, we did not find evidence that SLT was superior to medication in improving glaucoma-specific QoL. While we found superior IOP reduction in the medication arm, eyelid erythema and conjunctival hyperaemia were more prevalent in these patients compared with the SLT group.Trial registrationACTRN12611000720910.

Severity Classification of Conjunctival Hyperaemia by Deep Neural Network Ensembles

Conjunctival hyperaemia is a common clinical ophthalmological finding and can be a symptom of various ocular disorders. Although several severity classification criteria have been proposed, none include objective severity criteria. Neural networks and deep learning have been utilised in ophthalmology, but not for the purpose of classifying the severity of conjunctival hyperaemia objectively. To develop a conjunctival hyperaemia grading software, we used 3700 images as the training data and 923 images as the validation test data. We trained the nine neural network models and validated the performance of these networks. We finally chose the best combination of these networks. The DenseNet201 model was the best individual model. The combination of the DenseNet201, DenseNet121, VGG19, and ResNet50 were the best model. The correlation between the multimodel responses, and the vessel-area occupied was 0.737 (p<0.01). This system could be as accurate and comprehensive as specialists but would be significantly faster and consistent with objective values.

Changes in ocular signs and symptoms in patients switching from bimatoprost–timolol to tafluprost–timolol eye drops: an open-label phase IV study

ObjectivesBimatoprost–timolol (bimatoprost 0.03%–timolol 0.5% fixed-dose combination [FDC]) and tafluprost–timolol (tafluprost 0.0015%–timolol 0.5% FDC) eye drops are currently the only topical intraocular pressure (IOP)-reducing therapies available as preservative-free (PF) prostaglandin and timolol FDC. The aim of this study was to investigate changes to ocular signs and symptoms when patients with ocular hypertension (OH) or open-angle glaucoma (OAG) switched from PF or benzalkonium chloride (BAK)-preserved bimatoprost–timolol to PF tafluprost–timolol eye drops.DesignThis was a 12-week, open-label, phase IV study.SettingSixteen centres in Finland, Germany, Italy and the UK.ParticipantsPatients with OH or OAG (IOP on medication ≤21 mm Hg), treated with PF or BAK-preserved bimatoprost–timolol for ≥4 weeks before screening, and presenting with conjunctival hyperaemia and ≥1 ocular symptom.InterventionsPatients were switched to PF tafluprost–timolol once daily in the treated eye(s).Primary and secondary outcome measuresThe primary endpoints were change from screening to week 12 in conjunctival hyperaemia and worst ocular symptom. The secondary outcome measures were changes from screening in ocular signs (other than conjunctival hyperaemia) and symptoms at week 12.ResultsOf 123 enrolled patients, 121 were included in the intention-to-treat dataset, of which all were Caucasian and 54.5% were female; 76 patients used BAK-preserved bimatoprost–timolol and 45 used PF drops. Conjunctival hyperaemia and severity of worst ocular symptom following switch to PF tafluprost–timolol significantly reduced from screening to week 12 in all patients (p<0.001). The percentage of patients with ocular signs and symptoms was significantly reduced at week 12 compared with screening (p<0.001). IOP was not affected by the change of treatment.ConclusionsSwitching from BAK-preserved or PF bimatoprost–timolol to tafluprost–timolol reduced both signs and symptoms of ocular surface disease with no clinically relevant effect on IOP.Trial registration numberEudraCT2014-005273-37; Results.