Abstract

Viral keratitis is one of the leading cause of corneal blindness leading to corneal scarring and subsequent visual impairment. Improved understanding of presentation, early diagnosis and treatment, precipitating factors of viral keratitis can help in the prevention of permanent loss of visual acuity. Methods A cross-sectional study was carried out on 50 patients who are clinically diagnosed with viral keratitis in department of ophthalmology at Government General Hospital, Ananthapuramu for a period of 6 months from January 2023 to June 2023. These patients were examined for visual acuity, slit-lamp examination to know the size, shape of ulcer. Flourescein staining done to know the activity of the lesion, corneal sensations were checked, and anterior chamber reaction to rule out uveitis. Then these patients were kept on antiviral treatment for 2 weeks and followed up for determining visual improvement Results Out of 50 patients ,25 (50%) patients were diagnosed with HSV keratitis, followed by 15(30%) cases of HZO keratitis, 10 cases(20%) were of adenoviral keratitis. Most common clinical presentation was epithelial keratitis (70%), followed by subepithelial keratitis(20%), stromal keratitis with ulceration(6%) and neurotrophic keratitis (4%). Fever (50%) was the most common precipitating factor followed by URTI (20%), Steroid instillation (16%), trauma (10%), spontaneous (4%). Out of 50 patients most of them had visual acuity in the range of 6/6 to 6/36 which was improved to the range of 6/6 to 6/12 after 2 weeks of antiviral treatment. Conclusion Herpes simplex keratitis is the most common viral keratitis encountered in our study and epithelial keratitis in the form of dendritic ulcer is the most common clinical presentation seen. Fever was the major precipitating factor. All these patients had significant improvement in the visual outcome following treatment for 2 weeks.

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