Purpose. To evaluate the corneal aberration changes in
dry eye patients
after treatment with
artificial eye drops. Methods. Thirty mild to moderate
dry eye patients treated with
artificial eye drops and twenty comparable
dry eye patients were recruited as controls. Anterior corneal aberrations over 3 mm and 5 mm analytical zones including total, 3rd to 5th high order aberrations (HOAs), spherical aberration (SA), and vertical (V-
coma) and horizontal
coma (H-
coma) obtained from corneal topography data at baseline and 2 weeks
after treatment were evaluated. Results. For 3 mm zone, trefoils, V-
coma, H-
coma terms, and 3rd and 5th HOAs were significantly decreased (p < 0.05) in the treatment group. For 5 mm zone, instillation of
eye drops reduced H-
coma, SA terms, 3rd to 5th orders, and total HOAs all showed a significant decrease (p < 0.05). The root mean square analysis of the Zernike terms also showed similar statistical results. For control group, all individual terms and total HOAs did not have significant changes over 3 mm and 5 mm zones (p > 0.05). Conclusions. Treatment with
artificial eye drops can effectively improve the corneal optical quality of
dry eye patients by ameliorating the HOAs of anterior corneal surface.