acyclovir and Conjunctivitis--Allergic

To evaluate the risk of ocular surface herpetic eye disease (osHED) in allergic eye disease.. We calculated the risk for osHED in 11,205 patients on antiallergic ocular topical agents compared with 453,069 controls based on filled prescriptions for topical acyclovir between 2001 and 2003.. Significantly more allergic patients, of all age groups, received treatment for osHED (p < 0.01). The age and gender adjusted relative risk for allergic patients to suffer an osHED event was 2.31 (95% CI: 1.84-2.90), raising to 3.55 (95% CI: 2.0-6.4) in patients that filled > or = 4 antiallergic prescriptions.. Patients treated for allergic eye disease have an increased risk of osHED.

Topics: Acyclovir; Adult; Anti-Allergic Agents; Antiviral Agents; Conjunctivitis, Allergic; Databases, Factual; Drug Prescriptions; Female; Health Maintenance Organizations; Humans; Keratitis, Herpetic; Male; Middle Aged; Risk