Abstract
Purpose:
To compare visual acuity (VA) and metamorphopsia scores in patients affected by idiopathic macular epiretinal membranes (ERM) respectively associated or not to retinal vessel printings (RVPs) on fundus autofluorescence (FAF) imaging. RVPs are hyperautofluorescent lines parallel to retinal vessel and are a sign of retinal translocation.
Methods:
Cross-sectional study. The enrolled patients were divided in two groups on the basis of the presence/absence on FAF imaging of RPVs. LogMAR best-corrected VA measured using ETDRS charts, spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (sd-OCT) and FAF using the Spectralis HRA+OCT (Heidelberg Engineering, Heidelberg, Germany) were recorded in each case.The eyes showing irregularity or disruption of the hyperreflective outer retinal lines at the fovea by OCT were excluded. Metamorphopsia scores were evaluated using M-charts (Inami Co., Tokyo, Japan). Central foveal thickness (CFT) and average foveal thickness (AFT) [1-mm area centered on the umbo] were automatically calculated using the integrated software of the machine. The Mann-Withney U-test was used to compare the data. P<0.05 was considered statistically significant.
Results:
Fifteen patients were recruited for each group. CFT, AFT and horizontal and vertical metamorphopsia scores did not differ between the two groups (P=1.0, 0.7, 0.5 and 0.7 respectively). Median best-corrected VA was 0.4 [95% confidence interval 0.2-0.5] and 0.15 [95% confidence interval 0.1-0.3] in the group with and without RVPs respectively and such difference was statistically significant (P=.007).
Conclusions:
FAF is an elegant and non-invasive tool to evaluate tangential retinal contraction in patients affected by ERMs. The reason why only some eyes with ERM and evidence of associated retinal contraction show RVPs has to be elucidated. In this study similar CFT, AFT and metamorphopsia scores were found in the group with and in the group without RVPs. However, eyes with RVPs resulted to have lower VAs in comparison to eyes without RVPs. The lower VA recorded in the eyes with RVPs might be secondary to the more rapid development of retinal contraction caused by the ERM in comparison to eyes showing no RVPs.
Keywords: 762 vitreoretinal surgery •
585 macula/fovea •
550 imaging/image analysis: clinical