Ocular Manifestation of Tuberculosis

To determine the prevalence of ocular involvement in patients with tuberculosis (TB) infection. All patients with a new diagnosis of TB who were referred to Zahedan Tuberculosis Center underwent a complete ophthalmic examination. Any cases of known ophthalmic disease or previous ocular involvement were excluded from the study. Prevalence of ocular involvement with 95% confidence interval (95% CI) was calculated. Out of 444 eyes of 222 TB patients, 19 eyes (4.3%, 95% CI: 2.6-6.6%) of 17 patients (7.7%, 95% CI: 4.5-12.0%) had some ophthalmic lesions ascribable to TB. The most frequent ophthalmic lesions were choroidal tubercles in 4 eyes (21.1%); interstitial keratitis and acute iritis each in 3 eyes (15.8%); chorioretinitis, peripapillary nodule and lid lupus vulgaris each in 2 eyes (10.5%); and retinal vasculitis, vitritis and lateral rectus paresis each in one eye (5.3%). The ocular involvement was unilateral in 88.2%. Multiple logistic regression analysis revealed that only the duration of TB before treatment had direct correlation with ocular involvement (odds ratio= 5.22, 95% CI: 1.57-17.35). The frequency of ocular involvement in TB in the study population is at least 3 times greater than other countries. Early treatment of TB can reduce ocular involvement and prevent other complications of the disease.