Abstract
The current research approaches the retinal microvasculature of healthy volunteers (17 subjects), patients with diabetes mellitus without retinopathy (19 subjects), and of diabetic patients with nonproliferative (17 subjects) and proliferative (21 subjects) diabetic retinopathy, by using adaptive optics ophthalmoscopy and optical coherence ophthalmoscopy angiography. For each imaging technique, several vascular parameters have been calculated in order to achieve a comparative analysis of these imaging biomarkers between the four studied groups. The results suggest that diabetic patients with or without diabetic retinopathy prove signs of retinal arteriole structural alterations, mainly showed by altered values of wall to lumen ratio, calculated for the superior or inferior temporal branch of the central retinal artery, near the optic nerve head, and significant changes of the vascular density in the retinal superficial capillary plexus. Both adaptive optics ophthalmoscopy and optical coherence ophthalmoscopy angiography are providing useful information about the retinal microvasculature from early onset of diabetic disease, having a promising diagnostic and prognostic role in the future.
Highlights
Retina is, regarding its metabolism, one of the most active tissues in the human body, due to increased consumption of oxygen and nutrients
The current research approaches the retinal microvasculature of healthy volunteers, patients with diabetes mellitus (DM) without DR and of diabetic patients with nonproliferative and proliferative diabetic retinopathy, by using adaptive optics ophthalmoscopy (AOO) and optical coherence tomography angiography (OCT-A)
According to the Early Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study (ETDRS) guidelines [13], the study population was divided into 4 groups: healthy volunteers (17 eyes), subjects diagnosed with diabetes mellitus without retinopathy (19 eyes), diabetic patients with nonproliferative retinopathy (NPDR) (17 eyes), and diabetic patients with proliferative retinopathy (PDR) (21 eyes)
Summary
Retina is, regarding its metabolism, one of the most active tissues in the human body, due to increased consumption of oxygen and nutrients. The ocular system adapts in order to ensure the retinal metabolic demands, providing an appropriate visual function. Several pathologies, such as diabetes mellitus (DM) [2], arterial hypertension, and other cardiovascular disorders [3], target the vessels, determining morphological and functional changes, which can be essentially mirrored by the status of the retinal vessels. The Early Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study (ETDRS) considers the vascular lesions in the retinal layers to be the hallmark of DR [4, 5]. Several papers have shown that among the first changes spotted in the retina of diabetic patients are the ones in the vascular calibres [6,7,8]. Retinal vessel parameters may become valuable biomarkers for diabetic retinopathy [8]
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