title: Ocular leprosy.
abstract: Ocular involvement in leprosy is estimated to be 70-75%, about 10-50% of leprosy patients suffer from severe ocular symptoms, and blindness occurs in about 5% of patients. The disease leads to many ophthalmologic symptoms and signs in the range of the eyeball itself, as well as of the bulb adnexa, ie, eyebrows, eyelids with eyelashes, and lacrimal drainage system. Especially dangerous are complications of lagophthalmos and corneal hypoanesthesia, neurotrophic or infectious keratitis, and iridocyclitis and cataract formation, which may lead to significant decrease of visual acuity or even blindness. Multidrug treatment rapidly interrupts transmission of Mycobacterium leprae by infectious patients, but even after being completed, it does not guarantee the withholding of ocular complications.
authors.affiliation: Department of Ophthalmology, Poznań City Hospital, ul. Szwajcarska 3, 61-285 Poznań, Poland; Department of Ophthalmology, University of Warmia and Mazury, Olsztyn, Poland. Electronic address: ae.grzybowski@gmail.com.
authors.forename: Andrzej
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Grzybowski
authors.affiliation: Domestic and Specialized Medicine Centre "Dilmed" Katowice, Poland.
authors.forename: Małgorzata
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Nita
authors.affiliation: Research Department, Instituto Lauro de Souza Lima, Bauru, Brazil.
authors.forename: Marcos
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Virmond
mesh_terms: D001766:Blindness / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology; D003316:Corneal Diseases / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology; D005128:Eye Diseases / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000209:etiology* / Q000382:microbiology; D015818:Eye Infections, Bacterial / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000382:microbiology*; D005141:Eyelid Diseases / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D007634:Keratitis / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology; D007918:Leprosy / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis; D008297:Male; D009166:Mycobacterium leprae / Q000302:isolation & purification*; D011379:Prognosis; D018570:Risk Assessment