Determination of eye irritation potential of low-irritant products: comparison of in vitro results with the in vivo draize rabbit test

• Main Authors: Andréa Martins da Nóbrega, Eloisa Nunes Alves, Rosaura de Farias Presgrave, Rodrigo Netto Costa, Isabella Fernandes Delgado
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Instituto de Tecnologia do Paraná (Tecpar) 2012-06-01
• Series: Brazilian Archives of Biology and Technology
• Subjects: Alternative methods; eye irritation; Draize Test; low-irritant; HET-CAM; RBC
• Online Access: http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1516-89132012000300008

In an attempt to build the evaluation strategies to assess the human eye irritation, a reassessment of some in vitro tests is necessary, particularly concerning the non-irritants, mild and moderate irritants. Thus, the correlations between results obtained from the Draize test with the in vitro methods HET-CAM (Hens Egg Test-Chorion Allantonic Membrane) and RBC haemolysis assay to assess the ocular irritancy potential of 20 eye drops were examined. Parameters such as accuracy (%) and specificity (%) were determined. All results were correlated with RBC correctly with the results obtained in the Draize test. The HET-CAM presented four false-positive results, showing a tendency of data overestimation. Despite the high specificity provided mainly by the RBC, it would be necessary to test a wider range of products representing all the scales of irritation to confirm its ability to be used as a first alternative to test products that could be presumptive non-irritants.