Oral tolerance therapy with retinal antigens is a novel approach to treating patients with uveitis who require conventional immunosuppressive therapy to control their disease. In a pilot study involving 2 patients with uveitis, oral tolerance therapy with bovine retinal soluble antigen allowed the reduction or withdrawal of conventional immunosuppressive therapy, while maintaining good visual function. This approach is now under investigation in a doubleblind, placebo-controlled trial in patients with uveitis who are receiving immunosuppressant therapy. Details of these studies, and data from the preclinical investigations that led to the development of this approach in humans, were presented at the International Symposium on Clinical Immunology [San Francisco, US; July 1995].