Diagnosis and management of ocular leprosy.

The eyes may become involved in leprosy in three ways-as a complication of involvement of the facial and occasionally the trigeminal nerve(s); by invasion of the eyeball by large numbers of acid-fast bacilli in lepromatous leprosy; and by participation in the generalized allergic reaction, known as the reactive phase. It is curious that the eyeball is rarely, if ever, involved by direct spread from neighbouring lepromatous lesions. Bilateral symmetry of the eye lesions is common.