Article Text

Download PDFPDF
Association between external limiting membrane status and visual acuity in diabetic macular oedema
  1. Shin-ichiro Ito1,2,
  2. Noriko Miyamoto1,2,
  3. Kazuhiro Ishida1,2,
  4. Yasuo Kurimoto1,2
  1. 1Department of Ophthalmology, Kobe City Medical Centre General Hospital, Kobe, Hyogo, Japan
  2. 2Department of Ophthalmology, Institute of Biomedical Research and Innovation, Kobe, Hyogo, Japan
  1. Correspondence to Dr Noriko Miyamoto, Department of Ophthalmology, Kobe City Medical Centre, General Hospital, 2-1-1 Minatojima-minamimachi, Chuo-ku, Kobe Hyogo 6500047, Japan; miyacy_fr{at}hotmail.com

Abstract

Aim To evaluate the association between the foveal external limiting membrane (ELM) status and visual acuity (VA) in diabetic macular oedema (DMO).

Methods We retrospectively reviewed the spectral domain optical coherence tomography images of 127 eyes from 127 patients with DMO and evaluated the correlation between the logarithm of the minimal angle of resolution (logMAR) VA and the statuses of the foveal ELM, inner segment/outer segment (IS/OS) and cone outer segment tips (COST); foveal macular thickness (FMT); and presence or absence of hard exudates (HE), serous retinal detachment (SRD) and vitreous adhesion. The integrity of the ELM, IS/OS, and COST was classified into three categories (absent, disrupted and complete).

Results There was a strong correlation between VA and the statuses of the ELM (r=0.699, p<0.001), IS/OS (r=0.716, p<0.001) and COST (r=0.471, p<0.001). There was no correlation between FMT and logMAR VA (r=−0.036, p=0.687). However, when we analysed the correlation between FMT and VA by dividing patients into those with FMT ≤250 μm and those with FMT >250 μm, there was a positive correlation between FMT and VA in eyes with FMT ≤250 μm (r=−0.601, p<0.0001) and a negative correlation in eyes with FMT>250 μm (r=0.290, p<0.01). Other factors HE, SRD and vitreous adhesion did not correlate with VA.

Conclusions In DMO, the ELM status may be as closely related to VA as the IS/OS status.

  • Retina

Statistics from Altmetric.com

Request Permissions

If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.