Abstract
Purpose::
Descriptive study of ocular manifestations and complications of treatment of Behçet’s disease patients in a tertiary eye center in New York City.
Methods::
A retrospective review of 30 eyes of 18 patients with ocular manifestations of Behçet’s disease in a tertiary eye center in New York City. Demographic features, ocular and systemic manifestations, treatment and outcome were analyzed.
Results::
The study group consisted of eleven males (61.1%) and seven females (38.9%). Eight patients (44.4%) were White, four (22.2%) Asian, two (11.1 %) Hispanic, one (11.1%) were African American, and two (11.1%) were of mixed ethnic origins. Follow up period ranged (3-68 months) with a mean of (20.5 ± 5.5). The mean age at presentation was (36.3±10) years. Ocular involvement was bilateral in (12/18) (66.7%) of the patients. Panuveitis was the most common ocular manifestation (24/30) (80%), the second common ocular manifestation was retinal vasculitis, present in (11/30) (36.7%). Systemic manifestations included oral ulcers in (16/18) (88.9%) patients, genital ulcers in (11/18) (61%) and other skin lesions in (6/18) (33.3%) patients. (30/30) (100%) eyes were treated with topical steroids at one stage of their follow up period, (13/18) (72.2%) patients were given oral steroids and (13/18) (72.2%) patients were treated with immunosuppressive agents. Mean visual acuity showed a tendency for improvement from (0.49) to (0.36) LogMAR. Visual acuity either improved or stayed stable in (19/30) (63.3%) eyes with treatment.Complication resulting from treatment included cataract in (19/30) (63.3%) of the eyes, of which ten eyes had to undergo cataract removal surgery. The second most common complication was increased intraocular pressure in (12/30) (40%) of the eyes. This increase in intraocular pressure was successfully controlled by topical medication.
Conclusions::
This study reports the Ocular Behçet’s experience in a tertiary eye care center in New York City. Results from this study indicate similar demographics and natural course of the disease to those previously published from centers located in areas with higher incidence of the disease such as Turkey and Japan, in spite of the variability in ethnic origin of populations in the different studies.
Keywords: clinical (human) or epidemiologic studies: prevalence/incidence • clinical (human) or epidemiologic studies: outcomes/complications • autoimmune disease