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Decrease in Tear Film Lipid Layer Thickness in Patients with Keratoconus

Keratoconus (KC) is a progressive corneal disorder characterized by thinning and protrusion, mostly of the inferotemporal and central corneal regions. Dysfunction of the meibomian gland, the excretions of which form the lipid layer of the tear film, has been reported to be associated with KC. Thus,...

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Autores principales: Zhou, Wenyan, Yu, Haozhe, Feng, Yun
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2022
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9503260/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36142899
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/jcm11185252
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author Zhou, Wenyan
Yu, Haozhe
Feng, Yun
author_facet Zhou, Wenyan
Yu, Haozhe
Feng, Yun
author_sort Zhou, Wenyan
collection PubMed
description Keratoconus (KC) is a progressive corneal disorder characterized by thinning and protrusion, mostly of the inferotemporal and central corneal regions. Dysfunction of the meibomian gland, the excretions of which form the lipid layer of the tear film, has been reported to be associated with KC. Thus, this manuscript investigates the correlation among lipid layer thickness (LLT), partial blink rate (PBR), and KC of different degrees. This retrospective study included 54 patients and 24 healthy controls. The anterior corneal curvature, LLT, and PBR were taken from the unilateral eye of all 78 participants. The difference in those ocular parameters between the moderate and severe groups and the control group is significant. No significant association was found between anterior corneal curvature and LLT (r = −0.2, p = 0.15) across all the patients. However, there was a significant negative correlation between anterior corneal curvature and LLT in moderate (r = −0.6, p < 0.05) and severe (r = −0.7, p < 0.05) keratoconus cases. The results also show a significant negative correlation between anterior corneal curvature and PBR (r = −0.41, p < 0.05). Therefore, we conclude that the severity of keratoconus is associated with the thinning of LLT and the reduction of PBR. This may relate to a further epithelial abnormality with the reduced protection of tear film from the air, leading to the release of proteolytic enzymes that degrade stromal collagen and weaken the cornea.
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spelling pubmed-95032602022-09-24 Decrease in Tear Film Lipid Layer Thickness in Patients with Keratoconus Zhou, Wenyan Yu, Haozhe Feng, Yun J Clin Med Article Keratoconus (KC) is a progressive corneal disorder characterized by thinning and protrusion, mostly of the inferotemporal and central corneal regions. Dysfunction of the meibomian gland, the excretions of which form the lipid layer of the tear film, has been reported to be associated with KC. Thus, this manuscript investigates the correlation among lipid layer thickness (LLT), partial blink rate (PBR), and KC of different degrees. This retrospective study included 54 patients and 24 healthy controls. The anterior corneal curvature, LLT, and PBR were taken from the unilateral eye of all 78 participants. The difference in those ocular parameters between the moderate and severe groups and the control group is significant. No significant association was found between anterior corneal curvature and LLT (r = −0.2, p = 0.15) across all the patients. However, there was a significant negative correlation between anterior corneal curvature and LLT in moderate (r = −0.6, p < 0.05) and severe (r = −0.7, p < 0.05) keratoconus cases. The results also show a significant negative correlation between anterior corneal curvature and PBR (r = −0.41, p < 0.05). Therefore, we conclude that the severity of keratoconus is associated with the thinning of LLT and the reduction of PBR. This may relate to a further epithelial abnormality with the reduced protection of tear film from the air, leading to the release of proteolytic enzymes that degrade stromal collagen and weaken the cornea. MDPI 2022-09-06 /pmc/articles/PMC9503260/ /pubmed/36142899 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/jcm11185252 Text en © 2022 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Zhou, Wenyan
Yu, Haozhe
Feng, Yun
Decrease in Tear Film Lipid Layer Thickness in Patients with Keratoconus
title Decrease in Tear Film Lipid Layer Thickness in Patients with Keratoconus
title_full Decrease in Tear Film Lipid Layer Thickness in Patients with Keratoconus
title_fullStr Decrease in Tear Film Lipid Layer Thickness in Patients with Keratoconus
title_full_unstemmed Decrease in Tear Film Lipid Layer Thickness in Patients with Keratoconus
title_short Decrease in Tear Film Lipid Layer Thickness in Patients with Keratoconus
title_sort decrease in tear film lipid layer thickness in patients with keratoconus
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9503260/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36142899
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/jcm11185252
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