Autologous serum eye drops in refractory ocular disease

EAHP Congress Highlights

The use of autologous serum eye drops (ASED) was associated with promising real-world outcomes in patients with severe ocular surface diseases refractory to conventional treatment, according to a retrospective observational study conducted at Hospital General de Granollers, Spain.

ASED are derived from the patient’s own blood serum, producing a composition analogous to natural tears that promotes ocular surface healing and symptomatic relief. Despite growing clinical use, real-world evidence regarding their effectiveness, safety, and patient-reported outcomes has remained scarce.

This study enrolled 39 patients (mean age 66 ± 11.5 years) treated with ASED between August 2023 and August 2024. Diagnoses included severe dry eye (22), Sjögren’s syndrome (7), corneal injury (7), and other refractory ocular conditions (2). Symptom relief was reported by 28 patients, including improvements in dryness (10), foreign body sensation (6), itching (4), pain (4), irritation (3), and corneal ulceration (1). No adverse events were recorded.

Visual acuity data were available for 35 patients. Of these, 40% demonstrated improvement and 40% remained stable at six months, suggesting a favourable clinical trajectory even in the absence of statistically measurable acuity gains across the full cohort.

Patient-reported satisfaction, assessed using the validated Treatment Satisfaction Questionnaire for Medication (TSQM v1.4), indicated high scores across all domains: effectiveness 76.8 ± 24.3, side effects 100 ± 0.0, convenience 77.8 ± 16.4, and global satisfaction 84.9 ± 23.8. In total, 85.3% of patients rated global satisfaction at or above the positive threshold of 75.

The authors concluded that their findings support the use of ASED as a clinically relevant therapeutic option for patients with limited alternatives and highlight the value of incorporating patient-reported outcome measures into routine ophthalmic practice.