Dry eye prevalence and attributable risk factors in the eastern Madhya Pradesh

Background: There is increasing prevalence of dry eye in recent years. This disease is chronic and progressive and invariably leads to complications, if left untreated. Objective: To study the prevalence, incidence, and attributable risk factors associated with dry eye syndrome in eastern Madhya Pradesh region. Materials and Methods: This study included 1178 patients of which 114 patients were found to have dry eye. After detailed history, complete work up, and investigations patients were categorized into mild, moderate, and severe grades. Result: In this study, the prevalence of dry eye in hospital-based population in eastern Madhya Pradesh was 9.6%. Dry eye was more common in women (66.6%). Most patients in this study belonged to rural background (60.5%). Air pollution (33.3%) was found to be the most common attributable risk factor affecting most of the farmers/laborers (33.4%). In this study 43.8% patients had moderate and 39.6% patients had mild grade of dry eye. Conclusion: Diagnosis of dry eye is often overlooked as a possible cause of patient's complaint. Therefore, detection of disease at the earliest stage and prevention of attributable risk factors for dry eye alluded to in literature include air pollution, cigarette smoking, low humidity, high temperature, sunlight exposure, drugs, and uncorrected refractive error should be the goal so that disease progression to severe stage and serious sight-threatening complications caused by severe dry eye could be prevented. Thus prevention of attributable risk factors and early diagnosis could be the key for dry eye and offers good hope for better outcome.