Prevalence and Risk Factors of corneal ulcer in elderly patients with vision loss
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22812361Keywords:
corneal ulcer, microbial keratitis, elderly, vision loss, risk factorsAbstract
Background: Corneal ulceration is a leading cause of avoidable monocular and binocular vision loss worldwide, and its epidemiological profile among elderly patients differs substantially from the contact-lens-driven disease that dominates younger cohorts [1,7].
Objective: This review synthesizes the published evidence on the prevalence, risk factors, causative organisms, and visual outcomes of corneal ulcer specifically in elderly patients with vision loss.
Methods: We synthesized population-based incidence surveys, hospital and multicenter referral-center case series, and prospective outcome cohorts reporting age-stratified data on corneal ulceration from the early 1990s through 2021.
Findings: Older, non-contact-lens-wearing patients present predominantly with ocular surface disease, trauma, diabetes, and lid abnormality as predisposing factors [13,14,16], carry a Gram-positive-dominant organism profile [24], and experience delayed epithelial healing and worse final visual acuity than younger patients across every cohort examined [31,7,32].
Conclusions: Elderly patients constitute a distinct, high-risk subgroup within the corneal ulcer population, and as global populations age, health systems should anticipate a growing burden of ocular-surface-disease-related ulceration and prioritize prompt recognition and aggressive management in this group [36,12].
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