Abstract
Purpose
Corticosteroids are under suspicion of playing an important role in the development of retinopathy. We aimed to determine peripapillary retinal nerve fiber layer (RNFL) thinning by spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (OCT) in children being treated with inhaled fluticasone propionate due to asthma.
Methods
Thirty-eight children diagnosed with allergic asthma (mean age 9.8 ± 2.8 years, age range 6–13 years) and 40 age-similar controls were enrolled in this study. All children with asthma were taking inhaled fluticasone propionate at a dosage of 250 μg or more per day for at least 1 year. The RNFL thickness measurements were performed using Cirrus HD spectral-domain OCT 400. Central subfield thickness, cube average thickness, and cube volume were also measured.
Results
Among the 38 children with asthma and 40 healthy subjects who completed follow-up, children with asthma had similar mean peripapillary RNFL thicknesses compared with control children. The mean central subfield thickness was significantly higher than that of controls (248.8 ± 23.4 vs 237.5 ± 23.5, p<0.037). There was a positive linear relationship between cube average thickness and eosinophil count with a Pearson correlation coefficient of 0.336 (p<0.039) and a negative correlation was found between central subfield thickness and disease duration (r = −0.385, p = 0.017) in children with asthma.
Conclusions
Asthmatic children have similar peripapillary RNFL measurements compared to controls on spectral -domain OCT. Raised eosinophil counts in asthmatic children were found to be significantly associated with cube average thickness.
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