Changing Trends in Uveitis in the United Kingdom: 5000 Consecutive Referrals to a Tertiary Referral Centre

ABSTRACT

Purpose

To demonstrate changes in the demography and diagnosis of uveitis in a specialist clinic in the United Kingdom.

Methods

Retrieval of data including all new referrals to Manchester Uveitis Clinic from 1991 to 2020. The incidence and proportions of diagnoses between 4 quartiles was compared.

Results

5000 patients with uveitis were seen. Referral rates trebled over time. Highly significant increases in referrals were seen for multiple evanescent white dot syndrome-spectrum disorders, syphilis and tuberculosis; increases were also seen for herpetic retinitis, vitreoretinal lymphoma and sarcoidosis. Highly significant decreases were seen for Fuchs’ uveitis, Behçet’s uveitis and ocular toxoplasmosis.

Conclusions

Subspecialisation and de-skilling has changed referral patterns to specialist clinics; changes cannot be entirely attributed to disease incidences, which also vary between countries. International data are non-comparable. There are clear changes in referral patterns and disease incidence in this population, influenced by evolving diagnosis. Local data should steer care planning.

KEYWORDS:

• Casemix
• demography
• epidemiology
• trends
• uveitis

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported that there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.