A study from England may help guide you if you’re considering whether or not you should perform cataract surgery on a uveitis patient.

Ninety eyes of 76 patients were studied. Standard cataract extraction techniques had been used for all these patients. Unless such treatment was contraindicated, patients with posterior disease, chronic anterior uveitis, known macular edema and poor outcome of surgery in the fellow eye had been given systemic steroids preoperatively.

Ninety percent of 90 eyes showed improvement in vision. In those eyes with anterior disease, severe uveitis in the first postsurgical week was associated with a greater incidence of macular edema. The single largest diagnosis in posterior disease patients was panuveitis (n=24). This was the group that showed the poorest visual outcomes. Most of this group’s vision loss was caused by various conditions that were present before surgery was performed.