Meta-Analysis of Dry Eye Syndrome Risk After Orbital Tumor Radiotherapy

23 studies with 1,602 total patients were analyzed to investigate dry eye syndrome (DES) risk following orbital tumor radiotherapy. The meta-analysis found an overall DES prevalence of 31% and performed subgroup analyses by age, radiation dose, tumor type, and follow-up duration. The work was conducted by Mengyu Zong, adhering to PRISMA guidelines and using Stata 17 for analysis.

Use Cases

• Analyze the relationship between radiation dose (≥30 Gy vs. <30 Gy) and the incidence of dry eye syndrome across the 1,602 patient cohort.
• Investigate age-related risk trends by comparing DES incidence in patients aged ≥60 years versus younger groups from the meta-analysis results.
• Examine the association between follow-up duration (≥5 years vs. shorter) and reported dry eye syndrome rates in post-radiotherapy patients.
• Compare dry eye syndrome prevalence between patients with non-orbital lymphoma and other orbital tumor types included in the 23 studies.

Strengths

• Analysis aggregates data from 23 distinct studies, providing a synthesized evidence base.
• Includes results for 1,602 total patients with orbital tumors who underwent radiotherapy.
• Reports specific prevalence figures (e.g., 31% overall DES) and subgroup percentages (e.g., 41% for age ≥60).
• Follows PRISMA guidelines and uses the Newcastle-Ottawa Scale for quality assessment.

Limitations

• The dataset is a 772.9 KB document summarizing findings, not the underlying patient-level or study-level tabular data.
• High statistical heterogeneity (I² = 98.56%) was reported among the included studies.
• Subgroup analyses are based on aggregated study results; individual patient characteristics are not available.

Provenance

Source

Systematic review of literature from PubMed, EBSCO, and Web of Science.

Collection Method

Meta-analysis conducted following PRISMA guidelines, with statistical analysis in Stata 17.

Time Range

Literature published prior to December 1, 2025.

Freshness

Literature search covered studies published prior to December 1, 2025; the review itself was last updated on 2026-03-25.