Tear Metabolomics in Dry Eye Disease: A Review.

Mazyar Yazdani,Tor Paaske Utheim,Aboulghassem Shahdadfar,Helge Rootwelt,Katja Benedikte Prestø Elgstøen,Øygunn Aass Utheim

doi:10.3390/ijms20153755

Abstract

Dry eye disease (DED) is a multifactorial syndrome that can be caused by alteration in the quality or quantity of the precorneal tear film. It is considered one of the most common ocular conditions leading patients to seek eye care. The current method for diagnostic evaluations and follow-up examinations of DED is a combination of clinical signs and symptoms determined by clinical tests and questionnaires, respectively. The application of powerful omics technologies has opened new avenues toward analysis of subjects in health and disease. Metabolomics is a new emerging and complementary research discipline to all modern omics in the comprehensive analysis of biological systems. The identification of distinct metabolites and integrated metabolic profiles in patients can potentially inform clinicians at an early stage or during monitoring of disease progression, enhancing diagnosis, prognosis, and the choice of therapy. In ophthalmology, metabolomics has gained considerable attention over the past decade but very limited such studies have been reported on DED. This paper aims to review the application of tear metabolomics in DED.

Highlights

Tears are necessary for maintaining the health of the ocular surface and normal vision
The identification of single metabolites, metabolite ratios, and distinct metabolomic profiles in patients can potentially be used as biomarkers of dry eye disease (DED), aiding earlier and more precise diagnosis, monitoring of disease progression, prognosis evaluation, and the choice and monitoring of therapy
DED research to date has focused on comparing the metabolomic profiles from patients with that of healthy subjects in targeted and untargeted studies

Summary

Introduction

Tears are necessary for maintaining the health of the ocular surface and normal vision. Several internal and external factors may affect tear film composition, integrity, and stability negatively, resulting in dry eye disease (DED). It is considered one of the most common ocular conditions leading patients to seek eye care. The stages of DED can range from mild, temporary ocular discomfort to chronic, severe pain with deterioration of visual function (Figure 1). It imposes considerable economic and medical resource usage as well as quality-of-life burden on patients and society [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11]

Objectives

Methods

Conclusion