Purpose To investigate the choroidal thickness in patients with scleroderma and to compare them with healthy control subjects. Methods Forty-six patients with scleroderma (3 male and 43 female) and 31 healthy controls (6 male and 25 female) were included in the study. Twenty-five patients had limited-type and 21 patients had diffuse-type scleroderma. Only left eyes of the patients and control subjects were used in the analysis. Demographic features of all the patients and control subjects were recorded. Each subject underwent ophthalmological examinations including refraction, visual acuity, intraocular pressure, axial length (AXL) measurement, slit-lamp biomicroscopy, and fundus examination. Body mass index (BMI) was estimated for all participants. Results There were no significant differences between the patients with scleroderma and the control subjects in terms of age, gender, BMI, mean AXL, and mean spherical equivalent refractive error (SE) (P = 0.1, P = 0.086, P = 0.37, P = 0.55, and P = 0.072 respectively). The patients with scleroderma had significantly thinner nasal, temporal, and subfoveal choroid than the healthy control subjects (P 1 = 0.012, P 2 = 0.046, and P 3 o0.001, respectively). There were no significant differences between the patients with limited-type and diffuse-type scleroderma in terms of age, gender, BMI, mean AXL, mean SE, nasal, temporal, and subfoveal choroidal thicknesses (all P40.05). Conclusions Choroidal thickness in patients with scleroderma was significantly less than healthy control subjects. Vasculopathy in scleroderma is characterized by obliteration of arterioles and reduced capillary density may cause atrophy of choroid in patients with scleroderma.

The Valsalva maneuver may cause significant narrowing in anterior chamber depth, anterior chamber volume, and anterior chamber angle in the myopic and emmetropic groups, whereas it may affect only anterior chamber depth in the hyperopic group.

AimThe objective of the study reported here was to investigate the normal peripapillary choroidal thickness (CT), measured by enhanced depth imaging optical coherence tomography (EDI-OCT), in healthy Turkish volunteers.Materials and methodsIn this prospective cross-sectional study, 57 eyes of 57 healthy Turkish subjects were enrolled. Each participant underwent a comprehensive ophthalmic examination and peripapillary CT measurement using EDI-OCT.ResultsThe mean age of the 25 female and 32 male patients in the study was 30.9±10.6 years (range, 18–56 years). The mean peripapillary CT at the superior, inferior, nasal, and temporal sites was 225±57, 183±47, 220±57, and 233±59 μm, respectively. The inferior peripapillary CT value was significantly lower than the peripapillary CT values (P<0.001 for all), whereas no significant differences were found between the superior, nasal, and temporal peripapillary CT values.ConclusionThe findings of the study revealed that Turkish people had significantly lower peripapillary CT values in the inferior quadrant than in the superior, nasal, and temporal quadrants.

No abstract