Photo Credit: ktsimage
During the 2024 AAO Annual Meeting, presenters discussed various posters and research on retinal vascular health.
Paulo E Stanga, MD, and colleagues evaluated the clinical benefits of using 200° ultrawide-field (UWF) fundus fluorescein angiography (FFA) and 130-200° UWF optical coherence tomography angiography (OCT-A) for retinal vascular diseases. Forty eyes with conditions like proliferative diabetic retinopathy, retinal vein occlusion, and retinal vasculitis were analyzed using advanced imaging techniques. Both methods effectively highlighted areas of reduced blood supply and neovascularization, but UWF FFA with navigated swept source OCT was better at detecting intra- and subretinal fluid, leakage, retinal thinning, and vitreoretinal traction. However, OCT-A demonstrated higher sensitivity in identifying retinal ischemia, while UWF FFA remained the standard for detecting neovascularization.
Brian Woods and colleagues evaluated the impact of acetazolamide (ACZ) on retinal vessel changes in patients with idiopathic intracranial hypertension (IIH) using automated vessel analysis. Fundus photographs from 165 participants in a treatment trial (ACZ vs. placebo with weight management) were analyzed over six months. Results showed that ACZ significantly reduced retinal venule diameter compared to placebo, with a greater reduction observed from the first month onward. Arteriolar diameters also increased with ACZ treatment. The findings demonstrate that ACZ’s effects on retinal vessels can be detected and quantified through automated analysis of fundus images.
Raghad Alrasheed, MBBS, and Idrees M Adhi, MD, FRCS, examined the long-term effects of ranibizumab monotherapy on peripheral retinal vascularization in retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) patients. It included ROP patients treated with ranibizumab, with careful documentation of retinal changes under general anesthesia and imaging. Results showed that most treated eyes retained areas of avascular peripheral retina, with aggressive ROP cases requiring additional injections exhibiting more extensive avascular zones. Neovascularization developed in 11.36% of eyes, mainly those with aggressive ROP. The study emphasizes the need for long-term follow-up in ROP infants treated with ranibizumab to monitor post-injection vascular changes.
