The Mid-Term Effect of Preservative-Free Artificial Tears Containing Hyaluronic Acid on Dry Eye Incidence after Cataract Surgery: A Retrospective Cohort Study

The aim of this study is to survey the effectiveness of preservative-free artificial tears containing hyaluronic acid (HA) on post-cataract surgery dry eye disease (DED) prevention. A retrospective cohort study was performed, and patients that received cataract surgeries were divided into either an HA group or non-HA group depending on the artificial tear they used. A total of 37 and 74 eyes were enrolled into the HA and non-HA groups, respectively, after the selection. The primary outcomes are postoperative superficial keratitis and multiple (>3) DED symptoms. The generalized linear model was utilized to calculate the adjusted odds ratio (aOR) and 95% confidence interval (CI) of primary outcomes between the two groups. There were 10 and 2 episodes of superficial keratitis in the non-HA group and HA group, respectively, and the HA group demonstrated a significantly lower incidence of superficial keratitis (