Quantitative analysis of wide-field specular microscopy. II. Precision of sampling from the central corneal endothelium.

This content is PDF only. Please click on the PDF icon to access.

Abstract

The precision of the measurement of mean endothelial cell area obtained by sampling with small-field and wide-field specular microscopy from the central 4 mm of human corneal endothelium was studied by comparing endothelial cell parameters from individual specular micrographs in vivo to the results obtained by montaging the micrographs from the entire central 4 mm of the same corneas. The small samples were at least 10% from the true mean cell size of all cells of the central 4 mm in any endothelium other than that with the most homogeneous pattern. A new algorithm for sampling with these two specular microscopes will need to be derived to permit a more precise measure of the mean area of endothelial cells in the central 4 mm of the human corneal endothelium.