Dry Eye Disease: The Undervalued Impact on Quality of Life

Dry eye disease (DED) is one of most common ocular disease and reason for primary eye care visit worldwide. Besides ocular discomfort, visual disturbance is also a common symptom reported by patients with this disease. The symptoms may vary from mild to severe degree which can affect daily activities and quality of life. Studies have shown that DED interfered with reading and driving ability and associated with increased anxiety, stress and depression. Thus, DED should be considered as an important public health problem deserving increased attention. Unfortunately, the attention towards DED amongst eye professionals is still somewhat low in general. It has become a necessity to increase awareness and continue to carry out studies that will expand our understanding, support the innovation of new treatment, and improve patient’s quality of life. Simply throwing artificial tears to the patients expecting that it would immediately ease their symptoms is no longer acceptable. Patients with DED should be assessed comprehensively and treated as a whole, not merely “eyes that are not wet enough”.

Keywords:Dry eye disease; Quality of life; Quality of vision; Visual disturbance