No abstract

Uveitis is a manifestation of complex processes that can represent an infectious or a purely immune system modulated condition and may have grave effects on the eye. Much of the morbidity in these conditions is the result of the immune response to these stimuli. These infectious diseases may be successfully treated by addressing the inciting organism with recognized interventions. Treatment of the immune response to the organism often must be pursued simultaneously to minimize long-term complications caused by structural changes within the eye. Assisting the individual's immune response to eliminate the organism while minimizing the immune response's damaging effects remains a unique challenge drawing on both the science and the art of medicine. Several non-infectious conditions that are not autoimmune diseases may commonly masquerade as uveitis, leading to delays in appropriate treatment.

while others have not. 4,5 None of these reports had clinical evidence of choroidal involvement. The vitelliform lesions have been postulated to represent a new paraneoplastic clinical manifestation. The pathologic results in this case argue against a paraneoplastic entity but may suggest a local metastatic cause with subclinical choroidal involvement. Another explanation is that choroidal involvement occurred after the vitelliform lesions with the dissemination of the metastatic melanoma. Further studies are needed to determine the etiology of these vitelliform lesions in metastatic melanoma.

Uveitis is a manifestation of complex processes that can represent an infectious process or a dysfunction of the immune system that may have grave effects on the eye. Although infectious causes, once properly identified, may be successfully treated by addressing the inciting organism with recognized interventions, the immune-modulated chronic forms of uveitis often provide more complex challenges in management. Recent strides in understanding the inflammatory pathway and better bioengineering capabilities have resulted in some new modalities of treatment.

No abstract