Abstract
Purpose::
To investigate the clinical value of the ocular pulse amplitude in detection of early blood flow dysfunction in patients with Graves’ disease. Graves’ related pathological conditions are known to ultimately lead to reduction or even loss of visual acuity or atrophy of the optic nerve head due to increased intraocular pressure.
Methods::
The ocular pulse amplitudes were evaluated with the PASCAL-Tonometry (Ziemer-Ophthalmics, Switzerland) in a group of 54 patients with Graves` disease (38f, 18m). We perfomed computerized perimetry (loss variance = LV) (OCTOPUS 101, Haag-Streit, Wedel, Germany), visual evoked potentials (TOENNIES Multiliner® Vision, Hoechberg, Germany) and exophthalmometry (Hertel). SPSS 11.0 (SPSS GmbH Software, München, Germany) has been applied for statistical analysis.
Results::
Our results showed no significant correlation between the ocular pulse amplitude and visual evoked potential (latency or amplitude) (r = 0,004) and exophthalmometry (r = 0,003) respectively (Pearson corr.). Loss variance of perimetry and ocular pulse amplitude were correlated (r = 0,3).
Conclusions::
Pulse amplitude measurements with the new PASCAL device may be useful in early clinical documentation and follow-up of optic nerve damage in patients with ophthalmic Graves’ disease. It seems that ocular pulse amplitude may represent a sensitive indicator of subclinical neuropathy in such patients.
Keywords: optic flow • intraocular pressure • detection