Correlation Between Visual Acuity and Retinal Sensitivity Before and After Surgery for Macular Diseases

Abstract

Purpose: : to evaluate variations on retinal sensitivity and visual acuity with the evolution of macular edema features using OCT instrument and OCT-MAT (OCT-Macular Analysis Tool) software after surgical treatment for macular pathologies.Materials and

Methods: : 40 eyes of 25 consecutive patients were included in this observational prospective study (mean follow up 4.6 months) and divided in 3 Groups according to the macular pathology: Group 1 of 18 macular pucker, Group 2 of 12 macular hole, Group 3 of 20 diabetic macular edema. All eyes underwent functional and morphologic examination before and after the surgical treatment at months 1-3. Macular edema was classified on OCT examination (diffuse edema, cystoid edema involving outer retinal layers, cystoid edema involving inner retinal layers, serous foveal detachment) and subsequently studied on OCT-MAT software (ARVO 2006, ARVO 2007) to quantify in µm² different edema patterns.

Results: : pretreatment mean retinal sensitivity measured in all eyes was 9.8 dB and mean VA 0.32. At 3 months post surgical treatment mean retinal sensitivity was 14.6 dB and mean VA 0.6. Intragroups data analysis showed that microperimetry sensitivity and visual acuity recovery significantly correlated with macular edema patterns.

Conclusions: : the correlation between VA and retinal sensitivity parameters was significative in diffuse macular edema rather than in other intraretinal edema patterns. Moreover, on the considered pathologies, intraretinal cysts number and dimension in µm² are related to different results in retinal sensitivity and VA recovery.

Keywords: perimetry • macula/fovea • edema