Abstract
Purpose :
Determine non-invasive vascular parameters through optical coherence tomography angiography (OCTA) imaging to assess inflammation in ocular surface disease.
Methods :
Total of 25 eyes of 25 patients were included. OCTA conjunctival automated measurements (vessel density, diameter and tortuosity) through imageJ were correlated to corneal dendritiform cell (DC) density as assessed by in vivo confocal microscopy (manual count) and slit-lamp validated bulbar redness (VBR) grading at the same visit as surrogates of ocular surface inflammation. Nasal and temporal conjunctiva were averaged per eye for analysis.
Results :
Thirteen eyes of 13 patients with dry eye disease, 2 eyes of 2 patients with acute herpetic keratitis, and 10 eyes of 10 patients with non-acute herpetic keratitis were assessed. Mean age was 60.3±11.4 years with 17 females (68.0%). Mean VBR grading was 2.8±1.0 [1-5] and mean DC density was 131.3±93.9 cells/mm3 [12.5-385.4]. Mean OCTA vessel density, vessel diameter index, and tortuosity index were 44.6±5.1% [35.2-54.8], 5.4±0.2 [4.9-5.8] and 1.8±0.1 [1.6-1.8], respectively. Conjunctival vessel density was the best parameter, showing a stronger correlation to the objective parameter of central corneal DC density (r=0.553, p=0.004) compared to the subjective VBR grading (r=0.539, p=0.005). In VBR grades 2 and 3, there was a higher variability in both conjunctival vessel density and DC density, suggesting inflammation not detected by VBR.
Conclusions :
OCTA conjunctival vessel density may be a novel, automated and objective surrogate for ocular surface inflammation that could detect subclinical inflammation.
This abstract was presented at the 2024 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Seattle, WA, May 5-9, 2024.