Mohamed Anjum, Radha Annamalai, Muthayya Muthukumar

Aim: The uveal tract is most commonly involved in tuberculosis (TB). This study was done to

1. Identify the incidence of uveitis in various forms of TB.
2. Identify the frequent types of uveitis.
3. Type of presentation.
4. Complications with each type of uveitis.

Methods: It is a retrospective study of 45 patients over a period of one year who were referred with systemic infections. A complete ophthalmic evaluation was performed in all patients. Ancillary investigations were done whenever required. Laboratory investigations such as complete blood count, Mantoux test, X ray chest, polymerase chain reaction, real time PCR, ELISA, IgG, IgM and IgE, ACE, serum lysozyme, Quantiferon TB Gold were done based on suspicion.

Results: Tubercular uveitis was present in 23% of abdominal TB, 5% of miliary TB, 17% of pulmonary TB and 4% of CNS TB.Anterior uveitis was seen in 53%, intermediate uveitis in 12%, posterior uveitis in 30% and panuveitis in 1%.Improvement of vision was maximum in anterior uveitis (67%) and recurrences were noted in intermediate uveitis (12%). Complications were most frequent with posterior uveitis in the form of vitreous haemorrhage, epiretinal membrane and macular oedema.

Conclusion:

1. The incidence of uveitis is high in TB and thus all patients with the systemic disease need to be screened.
2. TB uveitis can occur even in patients with no systemic involvement and this occurs due to allergic reaction.
3. Treatment for both is ATT and in our study the duration of treatment which worked best was 9 months.