Abstract
Abstract: :
Purpose: To study the intra-individual relationship in three human subjects between resolution and retinal ganglion cell numbers. Methods: Both eyes of three subjects with unilateral invasive ethmoidal or maxillary carcinoma were subjected to detailed clinical examinations on the day before surgery, which included enucleation of the eye. The clinical examinations demonstrated that the study eyes were not affected by the tumour or by the chemotherapy and radiation therapy given before surgery. Both eyes of all subjects were also examined using the High-pass Resolution Perimeter (HRP) of the Ophthimus System, Version 3 (HighTech Vision, Göteborg, Sweden). After surgical removal, the eyes were immediately prepared for tissue processing. GABA-ergic amacrine cells within the ganglion cell layer were stained with immunocytochemistry and excluded from the cell counts. Ganglion cell separations were calculated from ganglion cell densities adjusted for central ganglion cell displacement. Intra-individual relations between resolution and ganglion cell separation at eccentricities between 6 to 28 degrees were analysed under the hypothesis of a linear regression through the origin. Results: Using a linear model with origin constraint we obtained high correlation coefficients for the regressions (R = 0.984, 0.973, and 0.990, respectively) and strong statistical significance for the direction coefficient of all three subjects (p = 0.000, 0.001, and 0.001, respectively). Since no significant difference among the slopes was found in the individual analysis a linear model with origin constraint and a common slope was fitted to the pooled data of all three subjects. Similar results were obtained (R = 0.978 and p = 0.000). Conclusions: We established strong linear relationships between resolution and ganglion cell separation through the origin for both individual and pooled regressions. The results support the hypothesis of a direct proportionality through the origin, except for random variations, between retinal ganglion cell separation and resolution threshold.
Keywords: retina: proximal(bipolar, amacrine, and gangli • visual acuity • perimetry