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Published on: November 8, 2015
Clinical treatment of dry eye using 0.03% tacrolimus eye drops
Bernardo K Moscovici1, Ricardo Holzchuh, Brenda B Chiacchio
1Department of Ophthalmology, School of Medicine, University of São Paulo (Hospital das Clínicas of da Universidade de São Paulo), São Paulo, Brazil.
Purpose:
To report the clinical outcome of the treatment of dry eyes using 0.03% tacrolimus eye drops (olive oil + tacrolimus 0.03%) (Ophthalmos, Sao Paulo, Brazil).
Methods:
Sixteen eyes of 8 patients with Sjögren syndrome dry eyes (age, 51.13 ± 9.45 years) were enrolled in this study (prospective noncontrolled interventional case series). Patients were instructed to use topical 0.03% tacrolimus eye drops twice a day (every 12 hours) in the lower conjunctival sac. Schirmer I test, break-up time, corneal fluorescein, and rose bengal staining score were performed in all patients 1 day before, and 14, 28, and 90 days after treatment with 0.03% tacrolimus eye drops.
Results:
The average fluorescein staining and rose bengal staining scores improved statistically significantly after 14 days of treatment and improved even more after 28 and 90 days. The average Schirmer I test did not improve statistically significantly after 28 days of treatment, although we did observe a significant improvement after 90 days of treatment with 0.03% tacrolimus eye drops. The average break-up time did not improve statistically after 14 days of treatment, although we observed a significant improvement after 28 and 90 days of treatment with 0.03% tacrolimus eye drops.
Conclusions:
Topical 0.03% tacrolimus eye drops successfully improved tear stability and ocular surface status in patients with dry eyes.
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