title: Severity and determinants of pinguecula in a hospital-based population.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Pinguecula is a relatively frequent disease; however, there have been no reports about the grade of pinguecula. We investigated the relationship between age and the prevalence and severity of pinguecula by using a grading system and compared the grade of pinguecula between men and women and between the nasal and temporal halves of the conjunctiva.
  
  
  METHODS
  This was a prospective, randomized study of 1,040 patients aged 1 to 95 years, including 520 men and 520 age-matched women. The age, gender, medical history, ocular history, and grade of pingueculae located on the nasal and temporal conjunctiva were determined in all subjects.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The prevalence of pinguecula increased dramatically with age. The mean grade was higher in male patients than in female patients for pingueculae located on both the nasal conjunctiva (P = 0.00072) and the temporal conjunctiva (P = 0.00035). However, there was no significant difference in the grade of pinguecula between the nasal and temporal conjunctiva.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This was the first assessment of the grade of pinguecula in a large series of patients. Our findings strongly suggest that pinguecula is an age-dependent lesion that occurs from young adulthood onward. The present grading system should also be useful for future clinical studies of pinguecula.
authors.affiliation: Department of Ophthalmology, University of Tokyo Graduate School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan. mimurat-tky@umin.ac.jp
authors.forename: Tatsuya
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Mimura
authors.forename: Tomohiko
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Usui
authors.forename: Hiroto
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Obata
authors.forename: Satoru
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Yamagami
authors.forename: Mikiro
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Mori
authors.forename: Hideharu
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Funatsu
authors.forename: Hidetaka
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Noma
authors.forename: Kazuhiro
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Dou
authors.forename: Shiro
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Amano
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D017677:Age Distribution; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003229:Conjunctival Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007297:Inpatients / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015995:Prevalence; D011446:Prospective Studies; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D017678:Sex Distribution; D055815:Young Adult