Reliability of corneal, epithelial and stromal thickness mapping for a 9 mm zone using spectral-domain optical coherence tomography

Session Details

Session Title: Anterior Segment Imaging

Session Date/Time: Monday 16/09/2019 | 14:00-16:00

Paper Time: 14:54

Venue: Free Paper Forum: Podium 4

First Author: : N.Mohr GERMANY

Co Author(s): :    D. Krause   N. Luft   M. Shajari   W. Mayer   S. Priglinger                 

Abstract Details

Purpose:

To evaluate the reliability of spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (SD-OCT; RTVue XR; Optovue, Inc, CA, USA) for mapping the thickness of the entire cornea (CT), the corneal epithelium (ET) and corneal stroma (ST) over a 9mm zone in healthy eyes. Moreover, we sought to elaborate reference values for different age groups and elucidate potential sex- and age-dependent changes in corneal (sublayer) pachymetry.

Setting:

All examinations were performed at the University Eye Hospital Munich.

Methods:

The same examiner obtained 167 healthy right eyes of 76 male and 91 female subjects (mean age = 50±20.0 years) three consecutive times. The thickness maps calculated by the automated B-scan analysis software contain 25 sectors over a 9mm diameter zone. To test measurement reliability, intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and coefficient of variation (CoV) were calculated. Subjects were divided into subgroups stratified by gender and age to examine potential sex- and age-dependence of data.

Results:

Preliminary results showed that for all sectors within the 9mm zone of the CT, ET and ST ICC ranged from .998 to .961, .945 to .896 and .998 to .955. The CoV values were 0.3% to 1.5%, 1.6% to 4.2% and 0.4% to 1.7%. A significant negative correlation was found between age and each sector of the ET (p<0.05) but not between age and ST or CT. No gender-dependent differences in CT, ET or ST were detected.

Conclusions:

The SD-OCT system provided excellent reliability for corneal pachymetry and sublayer thickness measurements throughout the entire 9mm zone in healthy eyes. The reliability was not affected by gender or age. Our results in healthy eyes can serve as a normative database for future studies of corneal pathologies.

Financial Disclosure:

None