Abstract
We investigated morphological changes of retinal arteries to determine their association with the blood flow and systemic variables in type 2 diabetes patients. The patients included 47 non-diabetic retinopathy eyes, 36 mild or moderate nonproliferative diabetic retinopathy (M-NPDR) eyes, 22 severe NPDR (S-NPDR) eyes, 32 PDR eyes, and 24 normal eyes as controls. The mean wall to lumen ratio (WLR) measured by adaptive optics camera was significantly higher in the PDR groups than in all of the other groups (all P < 0.001). However, the external diameter of the retinal vessels was not significantly different among the groups. The mean blur rate (MBR)-vessel determined by laser speckle flowgraphy was significantly lower in the PDR group than in the other groups (P < 0.001). The WLR was correlated with MBR-vessel (r = − 0.337, P < 0.001), duration of disease (r = 0.191, P = 0.042), stage of DM (r = 0.643, P < 0.001), systolic blood pressure (r = 0.166, P < 0.037), and presence of systemic hypertension (r = 0.443, P < 0.001). Multiple regression analysis demonstrated that MBR-vessel (β = − 0.389, P < 0.001), presence of systemic hypertension (β = 0.334, P = 0.001), and LDL (β = 0.199, P = 0.045) were independent factors significantly associated with the WLR. The increased retinal vessel wall thickness led to a narrowing of lumen diameter and a decrease in the blood flow in the PDR group.
Highlights
We investigated morphological changes of retinal arteries to determine their association with the blood flow and systemic variables in type 2 diabetes patients
Our results showed that the high-resolution images obtained by the Adaptive optics (AO)-camera allowed us to measure the different morphological parameters of the retinal arteries
Laser speckle flowgraphy (LSFG) allowed us to measure the relative blood flow. These measurements were made in patients at different stages of diabetic retinopathy (DR), and the results allowed us to determine whether significant correlations were present between the morphological and blood flow characteristics of the retinal arterial vessels and the stage of the DR
Summary
We investigated morphological changes of retinal arteries to determine their association with the blood flow and systemic variables in type 2 diabetes patients. The increased retinal vessel wall thickness led to a narrowing of lumen diameter and a decrease in the blood flow in the PDR group. The severity of the retinopathy and renal dysfunction were found to be associated with the degree of retinal arteriolar narrowing in patients with type1 diabetes[5] This narrowing is important because it is related to the incidence of strokes and cardiovascular disease in the general population and in individuals with diabetes[6, 7]. The authors of these studies concluded that there was a significant association between the retinal vessel diameter and systemic complications. Studies have evaluated the retinal vessels including wall thickness and the WLR in detail using the images obtained by an AO c amera[12,13,14,15,16,17]
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