Risk of uveitis recurrence higher in year after COVID vaccination – University of Minnesota Twin Cities

National Eye Institute / Wikimedia Commons

The incidence of uveitis in the year after COVID-19 was 17% among nearly 474,000 Korean adults with a history of the inflammatory eye condition, according to areport in JAMA Ophthalmology.

Researchers at the Hanyang University College of Medicine in Seoul mined theKorean National Health Insurance Service and Korea Disease Control and Prevention Agency databases for information on473,934 patients diagnosed as having uveitis from January 2015 to February 2021.

The patients had previously had uveitis and had received at least one dose of an mRNA (Pfizer/BioNTech or Moderna) or adenovirus vectorbased (AstraZeneca or Johnson & Johnson) COVID-19 vaccine. The average patient age was 58.9 years, 51.3% were women, and none tested positive for COVID-19 during the study period.

Uveitisis a potentially serious inflammation of the eye's middle layer of tissue that can cause symptoms such as pain, redness, and blurry vision.

The incidence of uveitis was 8.6% at 3 months, 12.5% at 6 months, and 16.8% at 1 year. The odds of uveitis were increased among recipients of all four vaccines, including Pfizer (hazard ratio [HR], 1.68), Moderna (HR, 1.51),AstraZeneca (HR, 1.60), andJohnson & Johnson(HR, 2.07). The risk was highest in the first 30 days after vaccination and peaked between the first and second doses (HR, 1.64).

These results emphasize the importance of vigilance and monitoring for uveitis in the context of vaccinations, including COVID-19 vaccinations, particularly in individuals with a history of uveitis.

"Although uveitis following vaccination is rare, our findings support an increased risk after COVID-19 vaccination, particularly in the early postvaccination period," the study authors wrote. "These results emphasize the importance of vigilance and monitoring for uveitis in the context of vaccinations, including COVID-19 vaccinations, particularly in individuals with a history of uveitis."

In a relatedcommentary, Anika Kumar and Nisha Acharya, MD, said it's important to weigh the risk of uveitis with that of remaining unvaccinated against COVID-19. "Indeed, other investigations of postvaccine NIU [noninfectious uveitis] that similarly identified increased risks of NIU after vaccination noted that effect sizes were small and attributable risks were low; thus, the findings should not preclude individuals from receiving a vaccination," they wrote.

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Risk of uveitis recurrence higher in year after COVID vaccination - University of Minnesota Twin Cities