Overview

Uveitis is a condition where you have inflammation of the uvea, which includes the iris, ciliary body and choroid. It’s common, and vision loss is one of the possible complications especially when uveitis is severe or goes untreated.Causes of uveitis are infection, injury, or an autoimmune or inflammatory disease. Early diagnosis and treatment are important to prevent complications and save your vision.

Symptoms

The symptoms of uveitis can vary depending on which area of your eye it affects. Experts organize cases into three main areas: anterior, intermediate and posterior. When uveitis affects all three areas, experts call this panuveitis. Symptoms may come on suddenly and get worse quickly. Though in some cases, they develop gradually. They may affect one or both eyes.

The most common of the three is anterior (front) uveitis. It affects the iris and ciliary body, and the symptoms are often visible to you or others. The symptoms of anterior uveitis include:

• Eye pain.
• Red eye or eye irritation.
• Blurred vision.
• Light sensitivity (photophobia).
• Swollen conjunctiva.
• Pupil shape changes (from a circle to an irregular shape).
• White liquid accumulating at the bottom of the front of your eye (hypopyon) or in a ring around your iris.

The symptoms of intermediate and posterior uveitis include:

• An increase in floaters (myodesopsias), or floaters that are easier to notice (they stand out more).
• Gaps or missing sections in your field of vision (visual field defects) in the affected eye.
• Decreased vision.

Causes

In about half of all cases, the specific cause of uveitis isn’t clear, and the condition may be considered an autoimmune disease that only affects the eye or eyes. If a cause can be found, it may be one of the following:

• An autoimmune or inflammatory disease that affects other parts of the body, such as sarcoidosis, systemic lupus erythematosus or Crohn’s disease.
• Ankylosing spondylitis, a type of inflammatory disease that can cause some of the bones in the spine to fuse, leading to back pain. Uveitis is one of the most common complications of ankylosing spondylitis.
• An infection, such as cat-scratch disease, shingles, syphilis, toxoplasmosis or tuberculosis.
• Medicine side effect.
• Eye injury or surgery.
• Very rarely, a cancer that affects the eye, such as lymphoma.

Diagnosis

Testing for uveitis itself starts with an eye exam, especially parts like the visual acuity test and slit lamp exam. Your specialist may also use tonometry to measure the pressure inside your eye and optical coherence tomography (OCT) to check for changes in the rear structures of your eye.

Other tests are also likely, depending on your symptoms and the suspected causes. Tests your eye care specialist may recommend can include:

• Blood tests. These can look for infections, immune markers or other blood changes that indicate a medical condition.
• Imaging scans. These can look for evidence of issues elsewhere, like a chest X-ray or a brain MRI (magnetic resonance imaging). Some imaging scans use special dyes like fluorescein, which providers can inject into your blood so they can easily see blood vessels inside your eyes. Changes in the dye patterns can be an important clue for providers to determine what’s causing uveitis.

Because the tests can vary depending on your symptoms and circumstances, your eye care specialist is the best source of information about specific tests. They can tell you more about these tests and why they recommend them.

Treatment

Because uveitis can happen for so many reasons, the treatments for uveitis can vary widely. There’s no cure for uveitis, but some conditions that can cause it are curable.

 

Above article is for information purpose only ,If you find any one suffering with uveitis please feel free to email us on query@gtsmeditour.com and get assistance for best available treatment abroad.