The Meibomian glands are located in the upper and lower eyelids, in the area corresponding to the tarsus. These are glands importantly involved in maintaining the quality of the tear film and good visual acuity.
Patients who have dysfunction of this gland, does not produce the right amount of fat secretion to the eye, and this causes the protective fat layer of the tear to be reduced, it causes the tear to evaporate producing a dry eye by association.
Normally patients who present this pathology in a chronic way, it causes them great discomfort to perform their daily tasks, such as the display of computer screens or other electronic devices, and are treated in different ways. Many of the treatments used are hygienic wipes on the eyelid edge, to maintain daily cleaning of the area. Anti-inflammatory eye drops, both corticosteroids and cyclosporine, express the glands mechanically after applying heat manually. The heat can be applied with hot packs or, with more sophisticated small machines of pulsed light), Another treatment option is with antibiotics in eye drops and / or orally, and also Omega 3 acids in capsules, etc.
Finally, in 2018, a meta-analysis of clinical studies was carried out, in which some conclusions were drawn about it. Some parameters such as tear rupture time, ocular symptomatology of patients, visible clogging of gland secretion, and Schirmer test or dry eye were evaluated.
In conclusion, it was observed that only antibiotics that were administered by the systemic route were effective, reducing the associated symptoms.
As for the treatment with Omega 3 acids, so fashionable today, the study showed that they did not cause a statistically significant improvement with respect to patients using placebo effect methods.
N-acetylcysteine was also not effective, and neither were heat treatments.
After this enlightening study,the conclusion has been that,we do not have other effective therapeutic resources,other than the associated systemic antibiotics.However,since it is a highly prevalent pathology in the general population,we are sure that the pharmaceutical companies will continue trying to influence its cause and improve results in the short-medium term future.
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