Poor correlation found between symptoms and signs in patients with MGD

There is poor association between symptoms and signs in patients with meibomian gland dysfunction (MGD), according to an analysis, which also found that age, hormone, and dry environment may impact the disease.

The severity of symptoms and signs at baseline of 122 patients with MGD were recorded. Patients were divided into subgroups based on possible influencing factors.

Standard Patient Evaluation of Eye Dryness Questionnaire (SPEED) scores at baseline were not correlated with tear breakup time, corneal fluorescein staining, meibomian glands yielding secretion score, or any index of eyelid margin abnormality. Patients who were older, menopausal, or living in northern China were more likely to have abnormal lid margins.

After adjusting for influencing factors, there was still no correlation between symptoms and signs.

“Further analysis suggested that each influencing factor has different effects on symptoms and signs, among which menopause affects the SPEED score and age and region have significant effects on eyelid margin abnormalities,” the authors wrote.

Reference
Xie L, Chen S, Hong J, et al. The lack of correlation between symptoms and signs in patients with meibomian gland dysfunction: a secondary analysis of the multicenter, randomized controlled trial. BMC Ophthalmol. 2022;22(1):351. doi: 10.1186/s12886-022-02576-8. PMID: 36031597; PMCID: PMC9420300.