Ultrastructural Study of the Conjunctiva in Patients with Keratoconjunctivitis Sicca not Associated with Systemic Disorders

Abstract

Morphological studies alone were able even in the earliest phases of KCS, to detect the squamous metaplasia that progresses from the surface of the epithelium to the connective tissue. This degenerative or adaptative cellular process was characterized mainly by marked proliferation of the cytoskeleton and a general loss of organelles, mitochondria being the least affected.