Dry eye is common in children with JRA

Dry eye is common in children with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis (JRA), reveals an investigation in the European Journal of Ophthalmology.

Dr Amany Abdel-Fattah El-Shazly et al., Department of Ophthalmology, Faculty of Medicine, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt, conducted an evaluation into dry eye on 40 patients with JRA.

The study consisted of 28 girls and 12 boys between the ages of 7 and 12 years. Each patient underwent medical history, clinical examination and a full ophthalmologic evaluation.

Tear filrm break-up time, Schirmer-1 test and corneal fluorescein staining were to test for dry eye. The control gropu consisted of 20 healthy age and sex-matched children.

The results demonstrated that 30 patients presented with consistent findings with dry eye diagnosis. First-degree dryness was found in 20 patients, second-degree dryness in 8 patients and 2 had third-degree dryness.

Dry eye severity tended to be significantly lower in remission, compared to amount of disease activity. The only factor that seemed to affect dry eye parameters was the duration of the disease.

The study authors suggest that all children with JRA should be screened for dry eye as the severity of dry eye is highly correlated with disease activity.