Clinical features, treatment and prognosis of patients with endogenous infectious endophthalmitis

To investigate whether the clinical characteristics, treatment and prognosis of endogenous infectious endophthalmitis (EIE) have changed over the past 5 years.

Retrospectively analyze all articles about EIE published in the PubMed, Web of Science, and Embase databases from 2017 to 2021.

A total of 128 patients and 147 eyes (46 left and 60 right) were included in the study. The mean age at diagnosis was 51 ± 19 years. The most common risk factors were diabetes and intravenous drug use. From 2017 to 2021, Klebsiella was the most common pathogenic microorganism (22%), and vitreous culture had the highest positivity rate. The most common complaint was blurred vision. The mean visual acuity (logMAR) at onset was 2.84, and the clinical symptoms were vitreal inflammation and opacity (63%), ocular pain (37%), and conjunctival congestion (36%). The ocular inflammation could be reduced by intraocular antibiotics or vitrectomy. However, the visual prognosis, with a mean logMAR of 2.73; only 50% of the eyes reached a visual acuity level of finger count and above. Changes in diagnostics over the past 5 years have mainly manifested as more diverse microorganism culture methods. In addition to conventional culture methods, PCR, sputum culture and aqueous humour culture are also commonly used for the diagnosis of pathogenic bacteria, improving the positive culture rate and visual prognosis.

The prognosis of EIE is poor. It is recommended to pay attention to the pathogenic bacteria culture results and accompanying systemic diseases and to diagnose and treat patients as soon as possible.