Abstract
Purpose :
To investigate the incidence of epiretinal membrane (ERM) formation following treatment with panretinal photocoagulation (PRP).
Methods :
A retrospective chart review of 753 patients who underwent PRP at the UNC Kittner Eye Center, from January 1st, 2010 to January 1st, 2017. Patients were identified by ICD-9/ICD-10 codes for diabetic retinopathy (DR) along with an encounter with the CPT Code 67228. Patient charts were excluded if the patient did not receive PRP for treatment of DR, had less than one year of follow-up data, had another disease associated with ERM formation, or had a procedure associated with ERM formation before the diagnosis of an ERM. Optical coherence tomography (OCT) images were reviewed to confirm the absence of ERM formation before the PRP procedure was completed and to confirm the diagnosis. OCT images were sent to two masked retinal specialists for interpretation of the presence or absence of ERM. A secondary analysis was performed to investigate differences between those who formed ERMs and those that did not.
Results :
The study population included 174 eyes from 125 (69 women and 56 men) eligible patients. The average age at the time of PRP was 54 years old, and 88.5% of the population was diagnosed with type 2 diabetes mellitus. Preliminary analysis found the incidence of ERM formation to be 32.95% (57 eyes) with an average time of diagnosis from the first PRP of 1.21 years. On average, there was no change in visual acuity before PRP treatment and at the time of ERM diagnosis. Mann-Whitney U tests comparing the number of spots, sessions of PRP, highest power used during PRP, age at the time of PRP, and the subsequent number of occurrences of vitreous hemorrhages following PRP between patients with or without ERM formation found the median value not to be statistically significant. The Fisher exact test found no statistically significant association between the diagnosis of diabetes and the formation of ERM.
Conclusions :
Almost 1/3 of patients with proliferative DR developed an ERM. Differences in power used during PRP, number of spots, and age at the time of PRP did not affect the formation of an ERM. On average, ERM formation did not affect patient visual acuity outcomes.
This is a 2020 ARVO Annual Meeting abstract.