Comparison Of The Clinic Of Non-Penetrating Corneal Trauma And Recurrent Corneal Erosion With Images Of Optical Coherence Tomography

In this study, we describe our results of OCT imaging of the cornea of patients with non-penetrating corneal trauma and recurrent corneal erosion. These findings allow for better understanding of the morphopathology of ocular surface, contribute to clinical diagnosis, and may improve the management of these patients. AS-OCT can be used as an additional method to slit-lamp biomicroscopy in cases of eye trauma as a non-contact method to understand the depth of the injury and compare it with the clinical picture.

Department of Ophthalmology, Bogomolets National Medical University, Kyiv, Ukraine

We exemined 24 patients (24 eyes) with a traumatic corneal erosion and 12 patients( 12 eyes) with a recurrent corneal erosion(RCE). All patients underwent a standard ophthalmological examination: visual acuity, still-lamp biomicroscopy, corneal fluorescein staining score, ophthalmoscopy and AS-OCT. Obtained results of AS OCT correlate with clinical manifestations of corneal trauma and recurrent corneal erosion. 

In the case of corneal injury, a defect in the corneal epithelium and heterogeneous reflectivity of the stroma were observed. During the healing of the corneal wound, the defect was filled with hyporeflective epithelium, the hyperreflective stroma, the demarcation line were preserved. The mean total corneal thickness at follow-up was 529 ± 117 μm compared with the mean corneal thickness at presentation 458 ± 121 μm.In the acute period of RCE, the images show multiple irregular epithelial tears and defects with rounded edges, absence or collapse of a basement membrane, localized swelling of the epithelium. As shown in OCT images in reducing the clinical sings of RCE, we can distinguish zones of healthy epithelium from abnormal epithelium.

AC OCT provides an assessment of the structural changes of the cornea characteristic of non-penetrating corneal wounds and recurrent corneal erosion, which is important for diagnosis, monitoring of corneal epithelization and providing appropriate treatment.