Purpose:
To determine the incidence of idiopathic full thickness macular holes in Olmsted County, Minnesota
Methods:
Population based retrospective chart review of Olmsted County residents diagnosed with a full thickness macular hole between 1992-2002
Results:
In total, 96 eyes of 87 patients qualified for the study. The majority of macular holes were idiopathic; however, there were two macular holes secondary to trauma, one associated with high myopia, two after retinal detachment repair, one after macular translocation, one after unspecified eye surgery, and one with chronic inflammation. The incidence of macular holes in Olmsted County, Minnesota was found to be 9.59 per 100,000 per year. Idiopathic macular holes occur at an incidence rate of 8.90 per 100,000 per year (see Table). The female to male ratio was determined to be 2.3 to 1, and bilateral macular holes occurred in 10.3% of patients.
Conclusions:
Since previous studies have reported only prevalence of macular holes, this study uniquely determined the incidence of macular holes in a predominantly Caucasian population. The study corroborates the known female to male ratio, and rate of bilaterality.