This invention provides experimental animals suffering corneal epithelial damages,
such as dry eye, and methods of using the same to assay a variety of compounds
for evaluating the therapeutic effect on the disease, and medicine selected using
the method, wherein the corneal epithelial damage is induced by the steps of: using
a water-absorbing material having a physical state selected from powder, solution,
gel, jelly and tablet, and contacting the absorbing materials with the ocular cornea
to generate a difference in osmotic pressure between the inside and outside of
ocular corneal epithelium cells.
