Correlation between inflammatory profile in aqueous humour in patients who underwent cataract surgery using two techniques and cataract degree

Purpose: Cataract surgery is one of the most usual type of intervention worldwide. Thanks to the improvement of technology and investigation this kind of surgery has reached a very high success rate. Studies have compared laser and conventional techniques in terms of inflammation, but there are also other variables which can influence the final result, such as cataract degree, age or diabetes. The purpose of this study is to establish the influence of cataract degree in the inflammatory profile of the aqueous humour. Methods: The parameters determined in aqueous humour to compare both groups were interleukins (IL) 6 and 8 and cytokine tumour necrosis factor α (TNFα). Samples of aqueous humour were obtained during cataract surgery, before the lens was extracted and were analysed through Enzyme‐Linked Immunosorbent Assay (ELISA). Two study groups were established: femtosecond group (75 samples of aqueous humour from 75 patients) and manual group (54 samples of aqueous humour from 54 patients). Once this classification was made, the non‐parametric statistics of the median, Kolmogorov–Smirnov and the Mann–Whitney test were calculated to verify whether the degree of cataract influenced the inflammatory profile of aqueous humour. Results: No significative differences were noticed between the two types of cataract degrees, early and advanced and their inflammatory reaction to surgery, although there is a slight tendency in IL6 and IL8 to increase their concentrations in advanced cataracts. On the other hand, the opposite happens with the concentration of TNFα that diminishes in advanced cataracts. Conclusions: The inflammatory profile of aqueous humour can be affected by the type of surgery performed (femtosecond or manual surgery) but also by other variables such as age, diabetes or cataract degree. Regarding the last one, cataract itself can modulate ocular inflammation as there was a tendency in IL6 and IL8 to increase in advanced cataracts. Besides that, the decrease in TNFα aqueous humour concentrations in advanced cataracts may be due to a physiological attempt to restore basal cytokine levels.