Long-term postoperative perfusion status in giant retinal tears: a case report

Abstract Background Information about long term perfusional status of patients who have undergone successful surgery for giant retinal tear (GRT) macula-off rhegmatogenous retinal detachment (RRD) is limited. Purpose To examine long term perfusional, structural, and functional outcomes in normal control eyes and the eyes treated for different degrees of GRT-associated extensions of RRD. Methods One emmetropic normal eye (control), one healthy highly myopic eye (control myopic), and three eyes surgically treated for GRT (surgical), were included in the study for a long-term comparison of study outcomes. The surgical eyes were classified based on the degree of GRT-associated RRD extension as follows: One eye with GRT-associated RRD extension  270°. Structural, functional, and perfusional outcomes were compared with those of control eyes. Results All three included eyes were phakic and the condition was monocular. The mean age of the patients was 48.67 ± 8.50 years (range, 39–55 years). All three eyes had GRT macula-off RRD. The mean preoperative time for GRT surgery was 1.2 weeks. The mean pre- and postoperative best corrected visual acuities (BCVA) were 1.87 logMAR and 0.46 logMAR, respectively. The mean postoperative follow-up period was 19.67 ± 5.69 months. Proliferative vitreoretinopathy (PVR) resulted in multiple surgeries in one eye (31.5%). Long-term postoperative optical coherence tomography (OCT) showed abnormal retinal thickness, ellipsoid zone (EZ) disruption, and external limiting membrane (ELM) line discontinuities in one eye. OCT angiography yielded abnormal perfusion indices in the surgically treated eyes. Conclusions Our data showed multiple structural alterations in spectral-domain OCT biomarkers. One eye that developed secondary epiretinal membrane (ERM) proliferation showed a significantly improved BCVA after proliferation, and the internal limiting membrane (ILM) were removed. Perfusional findings were correlated with final BCVA. Despite a fully reattached retina without ERM proliferation, GRT-associated RRD has a guarded functional prognosis.