The following is a summary of “Psychometric assessment of patients with central serous chorioretinopathy and correlation with disease stage and progression: a case control study,” published in the February 2024 issue of Ophthalmology by Hufnagel et al.
Researchers started a retrospective study to compare stress, depression, and anxiety levels in patients with Central Serous Chorioretinopathy (CSC) to those with Branch Retinal Vein Occlusion (BRVO) and healthy controls.
They conducted a monocentric, longitudinal case-control study on consecutive CSC patients at a tertiary referral center. Controls without retinal disease were recruited from the oculoplastics clinic, and those with BRVO were recruited from the medical retina clinic. Patients completed pseudonymized tests measuring stress levels (PHQ-stress), depression (PHQ-9), and anxiety (GAD-7) at baseline and 3- and 6-month follow-ups, with elevated trial levels having higher scores.
The results showed 65 CSC patients, 19 HCs, and 19 BRVO patients. CSC patients exhibited notably higher stress levels at baseline compared to controls (P=0.009) but not compared to BRVO patients (P=1.00). However, no notable differences were observed between the groups at 3- and 6-month follow-ups. Acute CSC patients demonstrated higher scores than chronic CSC patients, which diminished over time. Depression and anxiety scores did not vary between groups at any point.
Investigators concluded that CSC patients had no initial stress difference from BRVO or controls, suggesting stress may follow, not precede, vision issues in CSC and similar conditions.
Source: bmcophthalmol.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12886-024-03356-2