Abstract
Purpose: :
To investigate a prognostic factor for visual acuity in patients with epiretinal membrane (ERM) using spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (SD-OCT)
Methods: :
41 eyes of 38 patients with idiopathic ERM underwent surgery for ERM removal. Ophthalmic evaluations included best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA) and OCT parameters at before and 1, 3, 6 months after surgery. Associations between the OCT parameters and BCVA were assessed at each time point. Correlation between postoperative BCVA and preoperative factors including age, preoperative BCVA, photoreceptor outer segment (PROS) length, central foveal thickness (CFT), outer foveal thickness (OFT), outer nuclear layer thickness (ONLT) were evaluated. The factors influencing postoperative BCVA were evaluated by multiple regression analysis.
Results: :
The PROS length had most significant correlation with BCVA at each time points (p<.05 respectively). The PROS length at 1 month was significantly decreased as compared with preoperative PROS length (p<.05), and that of 3 months recovered to baseline. Preoperative BCVA and the PROS length were significantly correlated with postoperative BCVA at 6 months (p<.05 respectively). Another parameters including age, CFT, OFT, ONLT were not significantly correlated with postoperative BCVA (p>.05 respectively). Multiple regression analysis showed that preoperative PROS length yielded the highest regression coefficient with postoperative BCVA (p=.0363, standard regression coefficient = -.335, Overall R2 = .289).
Conclusions: :
The PROS length imaging by SD-OCT was found to be a good parameter of BCVA at each time points after surgery and a predictor of postoperative BCVA in patients with idiopathic ERM. The PROS length changes after surgery may be suggestive of surgical damage and restoration of macular outer layer.
Keywords: retina • photoreceptors • imaging methods (CT, FA, ICG, MRI, OCT, RTA, SLO, ultrasound)