Rajni Rajan presenting “Assessing the efficacy and safety of therapeutic interventions for corneal neuropathy: A systematic review” at the Graduate Colloquium
Corneal neuropathy, characterised by damage to the corneal sensory nerves leading to ocular pain and discomfort, is a relatively recently described pathology with poorly defined diagnostics and treatments. The primary aim of Rajni’s review was to evaluate the efficacy and safety of therapeutic interventions for treating corneal neuropathy.
Rajni Rajan is a current full-time PhD candidate in the Department of Optometry and Vision Sciences at the university, supervised by A/Prof Laura Downie and Dr Holly Chinnery. She holds a Bachelor of Optometry (2000) and a Master of Philosophy in Optometry (2009) from the Elite School of Optometry, Chennai, India. She practiced optometry in the states of West Bengal and Maharashtra in India from 2001 to 2007 and worked as a clinical optometrist in the contact lens clinic at the Sankara Nethralaya Eye Hospital, Chennai, India from 2010 to 2017. Rajni has also authored 10 peer-reviewed publications, mainly in the areas of anterior eye research.
Her PhD research focuses on investigating the responses of corneal nerve and immune cells to nociceptive stimuli (pain) in homeostasis and corneal nerve damage in laser eye refractive surgery. These findings will provide the foundation for establishing the diagnostic utility of corneal sensory responses to pain for identifying individuals with corneal nerve damage. The identification of a suitable non-invasive biomarker of corneal nerve fibre integrity would have the capacity to be translated into practice for enhanced early detection of peripheral nerve damage. From the systematic review of almost 2500 citations, it was found definitions of corneal neuropathies were varied and a diversity of outcome measures were used, consistent with a lack of consensus on clinical diagnostic criteria and the absence of a core outcome set to inform outcome selection in RCTs.
These findings identify a need to standardise both the clinical definition of corneal neuropathy and appropriate endpoint selection for corneal neuropathy trials. Together, this will provide a foundation to more rigorously evaluate the efficacy and safety of new and existing therapies, to inform evidence-based practice.