TearScience, Inc.
TearScience® Establishes Center of Excellence to Assist Eye Care Practices with Optimal Implementation of Its System for Assessing and Treating Evaporative Dry Eye
Morrisvile, N.C.,—March 11, 2013—TearScience®, Inc., a privately-held medical device company, today announced Duke Eye Center of Durham, North Carolina, will become a TearScience® Center of Excellence providing eye care practices with education on implementing the company’s system for assessing and treating evaporative dry eye. As a Center of Excellence, Duke will host eye care physicians, practice administrators, and eye care technicians involved in dry eye patient education and assessments to gain practical and applied knowledge on using the TearScience® system to provide the best care to dry eye patients.
“Duke Eye Center has become a very important center for helping patients manage evaporative dry eye disease,” said Jeff O’Hara, vice president of North American sales. “Duke Eye Center runs a very effective and efficient dry eye program that will inspire other eye care practices who are about to integrate the TearScience® system. With a track record of success with LipiFlow® clinical outcomes and expertise in optimal patient flow, Duke Eye Center serves as a great model for other eye care practices.”
Evaporative dry eye is caused by a deficiency in the lipid layer of the eye’s natural tear film, resulting from blockages in the lipid-producing Meibomian glands located in the eyelids. A lipid deficiency can lead to evaporation of tears at a faster rate than normal, leaving eyes feeling dry, irritated, tired, and red. TearScience’s LipiFlow®system unblocks obstructed Meibomian glands during a 12 minute in-office procedure. Post treatment, the Meibomian glands may resume their natural production of lipids required for a healthy tear film.
“With evaporative dry eye being such a prevalent, progressive condition, there is a great need for dry eye expertise and good patient care,” said Dr. Alan N. Carlson, chief of the Corneal, External Disease, and Refractive Surgery Services at Duke Eye Center. “Duke Eye Center is very pleased to become a part of TearScience’s Center of Excellence program. We look forward to helping other eye care professionals become proficient at caring for patients with evaporative dry eye.”
Duke Eye Center is the first TearScience® Center of Excellence in the United States. The first TearScience® Center of Excellence, announced in December, 2011, was Toronto-based Herzig Eye Institute, a leading authority in laser vision correction and advanced cataract and refractive surgery.
The TearScience® system includes two medical devices, the LipiView® Ocular Surface Interferometer and the LipiFlow® Thermal Pulsation System. LipiView® measures the absolute thickness of the lipid layer of a dry eye patient’s tear film while LipiFlow® treats a root cause of evaporative dry eye disease by unblocking obstructed Meibomian glands located in the eyelids. The goal of unblocking the Meibomian glands is to allow them to resume their natural production of lipids required for a healthy tear film.
About TearScience, Inc.
Headquartered in Morrisville, North Carolina, TearScience has pioneered devices that provide significant clinical improvement in the treatment of evaporative dry eye. Of the millions of dry eye sufferers worldwide, approximately 86 percent have evaporative dry eye, which is caused by Meibomian Gland Dysfunction (MGD) and a lipid deficiency of the eye’s natural tear film. The Tear Film and Ocular Surface Society (TFOS) workshop, involving two years of work by 50 leading experts from around the world, concluded that MGD is an under-estimated condition and is very likely the most frequent cause of dry eye disease. Common symptoms of the disease include eye irritation, dryness, redness, tiredness, and visual disturbances. TearScience’s integrated, in-office system enables eye care professionals to effectively address a root cause of evaporative dry eye, obstructed Meibomian glands. For additional information, visit www.tearscience.com.