Abstract
Purpose :
The purpose of this study was to investigate wether there are differences between the macular flow density as assessed by swept source optical coherence tomography angiography (OCT-A) in eyes with non-occlusive retinal vasculitis with positive versus negative QuantiFERON®-TB Gold test.
Methods :
The macular flow density was evaluated using the OCT-A (Topcon DRI OCT Triton) in 10 eyes of 10 non-occlusive retinal vasculitis patients with positive QuantiFERON®-TB Gold test (quantiferon) and 10 control eyes of 10 non-occlusive retinal vasculitis patients with negative QuantiFERON®-TB Gold test. The ten patients with positive quantiferon (mean age 50±14years; m:f=7:3) were diagnosed as having latent tuberculosis (TBC) after excluding other causes of granulomatous uveitis and having normal chest imaging. The control group included patients (mean age 47±22 years; m:f=6:4) with non-occlusive retinal vasculitis due to unknown origin (n=4), to sarcoidosis (n=3), to acute posterior multifocal placoid pigmentepitheliopathy (n=1), to birdshot chorioretinitis (n=1), and to intraocular lymphoma (n=1). When OCTA imaging was done in the more affected eye all patients had active retinal vasculitis visible in fluorescein angiography. In all eyes flow density was measured for the superficial plexus. A custom image analysis approach using Matlab® measured the pixel density after binarization in 5 sectors defined by the ETDRS study (central sector: 1mm diameter, 4 sectors: 3.5mm diameter). For statistical analysis, groups were compared using one-way ANOVA with parametric post-t-tests with Sidak correction for multiple comparisons.
Results :
The macular flow density was non-significantly reduced in patients with positive quantiferon in the central (mean difference 1.18±4.64 [%], p=0.9997), superior (mean difference 1.09±4.64 [%], p=0.9998) and inferior sector (mean difference 4.49±4.64 [%], p=0.87). All other sectors showed no significant difference in terms of flow density (p>0.9999).
Conclusions :
Even in patients with non-occlusive retinal vasculitis we found reduction in microvasculature of the superficial plexus determined by OCT-A. The differences of macular flow density between patients having positive versus negative QuantiFERON®-TB Gold test were non-significant but flow density reduction seems to be clearly more pronounced in patients having latent TBC.
This is an abstract that was submitted for the 2018 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Honolulu, Hawaii, April 29 - May 3, 2018.