Prevalence of Dry Eye among Medical Students of KIST Medical College and Teaching Hospital

Abstract

Introduction: KIST Medical College is a tertiary center at Kathmandu with medical students
involved in different subjects for graduation. Medical students are prone to have dry eye due to
excessive use of projectors and computers for study and also due to excessive use of gadgets
such as moblie phones, tablets etc .Number of medical students come to eye OPD due to
symptoms of dry eye thus this study was done to check for the prevalence of dry eye in the fourth
year students. DED (dry eye disease) represents a heterogeneous group of conditions with tear
film insufficiency and signs and symptoms of ocular surface irritation. The clinical manifestation
of DED can be highly variable; hence the diagnosis is often based on combination of symptoms,
signs and clinical tests given that anyone of these alone would miss a significant number of
patients.This study was carried out to obtain the prevalence and the risk factors of dry eye disease
by schirmer’s test among the medical students of KIST Medical College.
Methods: This is a prospective hospital based study conducted among 4th year MBBS students
of KIST Medical College from 21st april 2019 to 5th May 2019. Data was collected in single sitting
with a questionnaire for dry eye symptoms and thorough ocular examination was done to rule
out any ocular abnormality and the schirmer’s test was done and students having Schirmer’s
test more than >15mm were considered normal and students having schirmers test <15mm
considered as dry eye.
Result: In our study among the total 116 MBBS students 47(59.5%) were female and the minimum
age was 20 years and the maximum age was 26 with mean age being 21.88(SD-1.18). schirmer’s
Test result showed that 28.4%of students had Schirmer’s test less than 15mm but among the 116
students in the study 3 students participated in the questionnaire but aborted to do schirmer’s test
and 69% had normal Schirmer’s test. Similarly, when the dry eye grading was done 12.1% had
mild dry eyes, 13.8% had moderate dry eyes and 2.6% had severe dry eyes.
Conclusion: Medical students are neglected population with a high prevalence of DEDs.
Preventive measures directed against risk factors among these students may help reduce the
prevalence and provide positive impact on student’s health.
Keywords: Dry eye disease, MBBS students, Risk factors, Schirmer’s test.