Purpose:
To evaluate foveal thickness after surgery in eyes with retinal detachment.
Methods:
Foveal thickness was retrospectively evaluated in 10 eyes (10 patients; average age, 52.7 years) with rhegmatogenous retinal detachment (RRD) with macular involvement. Vertical and horizontal cross section including fovea of the fourier domain optical coherence tomographic (FD-OCT) images at 1, 2, 3, and 6 months after surgery were analyzed. The distance between the surface of internal limiting membrane (ILM) and the surface of external limiting membrane (ELM), between the surface of ELM and the surface of inner and outer segments (IS/OS) borderline, between the surface of IS/OS and the bottom of IS/OS, and between the bottom of IS/OS and the surface of retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) was measured both in the vertical and horizontal images and averaged.
Results:
The mean ILM-ELM thickness was 140.1, 144.4, 136.9, and 149.4μm at 1, 2, 3, and 6 months respectively. The mean ELM-IS/OS thickness at corresponding periods was 24.6 , 25.2 , 28.0 , and 32.0μm. The mean IS/OS thickness was 20.0 , 30.7, 33.3, and 37.1μm. The mean distance between the IS/OS and RPE (the height of sensory retinal detachment) was 15.3, 16.0, 0.0, and 0.0μm. These results showed that the thickness in the inner retinal layer and photoreceptor inner segment was relative constant whereas the thickness of the outer segment increased after surgery.
Conclusions:
FD-OCT may enable a quantitative evaluation on the photoreceptor microstructure, which may be helpful for understanding and following up of the dynamic change in the recovery phase of RRD.
Keywords: retinal detachment • macula/fovea