Table 1.

Comparison of primary outcome measures.

Items	Groups	V0	V1	V2	V3	V4	p ∗
Quality of meibum (upper eyelid)	Treatment group	15.83 ± 4.43	12.17 ± 4.59	7.69 ± 3.35	3.79 ± 2.23	2.86 ± 1.44	<0.001
	Control group	15.05 ± 3.24	11.50 ± 2.99	9.82 ± 2.84	7.09 ± 2.71	5.77 ± 1.74	<0.001
	p #	0.465	0.541	0.014	<0.001	<0.001
Quality of meibum (lower eyelid)	Treatment group	13.07 ± 4.92	9.00 ± 5.08	6.17 ± 3.89	3.43 ± 2.96	2.55 ± 1.61	<0.001
	Control group	13.14 ± 4.97	10.14 ± 4.00	8.82 ± 3.29	6.77 ± 2.78	4.59 ± 1.87	<0.001
	p #	0.960	0.366	0.008	<0.001	<0.001
Expressibility of the Meibomian glands (upper eyelid)	Treatment group	1.62 ± 0.76	1.14 ± 0.65	0.60 ± 0.50	0.05 ± 0.22	0.10 ± 0.30	<0.001
	Control group	1.73 ± 0.53	1.68 ± 0.57	1.27 ± 0.45	1.18 ± 0.59	1.18 ± 0.50	<0.001
	p #	0.052	0.002	<0.001	<0.001	<0.001
Expressibility of the Meibomian glands (lower eyelid)	Treatment group	1.67 ± 0.57	0.95 ± 0.62	0.55 ± 0.50	0.05 ± 0.22	0.00 ± 0.00	<0.001
	Control group	1.91 ± 0.53	1.55 ± 0.51	1.14 ± 0.56	1.00 ± 0.62	0.73 ± 0.70	<0.001
	p #	0.102	<0.001	<0.001	<0.001	<0.001
Changes of eyelid margin (upper eyelid)	Treatment group	2.67 ± 0.72	2.31 ± 0.71	1.69 ± 0.71	1.21 ± 0.81	0.71 ± 0.71	<0.001
	Control group	2.68 ± 0.65	2.36 ± 0.49	2.05 ± 0.49	1.45 ± 0.51	0.91 ± 0.43	<0.001
	p #	0.934	0.752	0.041	0.212	0.242
Changes of eyelid margin (lower eyelid)	Treatment group	2.31 ± 0.60	1.90 ± 0.66	1.10 ± 0.76	0.60 ± 0.66	0.31 ± 0.47	<0.001
	Control group	2.50 ± 0.67	2.18 ± 0.50	1.55 ± 0.67	1.18 ± 0.59	0.68 ± 0.57	<0.001
	p #	0.254	0.088	0.022	0.001	0.007

^∗ p value of one-way repeated measure analysis of variance to compare data for each group at different time points; ^#p value of multivariate analysis to compare the treatment and control groups at a specific time point.