Light relief: Does LLLT help dry eye disease?

2 August 2023
Summer 2023
Public health

Interest is growing in the use of low-level light therapy to remedy dry eye disease. Adrian O’Dowd investigates the evidence behind the treatment.

Dry eye disease can cause symptoms of discomfort, visual disturbance and tear film instability, with potential damage to the ocular surface (Vehof et al, 2014). One treatment is intense pulsed light (IPL) therapy, which has been shown to be effective in treating patients with meibomian gland dysfunction (MGD) – the most common cause of dry eye (Thomas, 2021). An emerging treatment is low-level light therapy (LLLT), and alongside IPL is classed as a form of photobiomodulation. 

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