干眼症是泪液和眼表的一种多因素疾病，它可引起不适、视力障碍和泪膜不稳定。引起干眼症的起始病因很多，这些因素均可造成眼表面的病理生理改变。虽然干眼症的临床表现不同，但其病理生理改变是相似的。炎症是干眼症发病机制中最关键的因素，而细胞凋亡、性激素等也共同参与了干眼症的发病过程。干眼症治疗的常规方法是提供润滑的眼药水或泪液替代品，而新的治疗方法则是针对干眼症潜在的病因而不是单纯的缓解症状。尽管最近在阐述干眼症病理生理、发病机制及治疗方面的研究已取得了一定进展，但目前还没有统一的标准。我们旨在对干眼症的病理生理、发病机制和治疗作一综述。

Dry eye is a multifactorial disease of tear film and ocular surface that results in discomfort, visual disturbance and tear film instability. Many factors contribute to dry eye which cause pathophysiological changes of the ocular surface.Whatever the clinical situation of dry eye is different, the diseases show the similar pathophysiological progress. Inflammation is the key mechanism and the other factors such as apoptosis ,hormonal regulation are involved in dry eye pathogenesis. The main approach to the treatment of dry eye is providing lubricating eye drops or tear substitute. The newer treatment approach is to target the underlying cause of dry eye instead of conventional symptomatic relief. Although recent research has made progress in elucidating dry eye pathophysiology, pathogenesis and treatment, there are no uniform diagnostic criteria. This paper presents a review about the pathophysiology, etiopathogenesis and treatment of the dry eye.

中国山东省自然科学基金资助项目（No.ZR2010HQ060）