Eye Sign is an Alternative for Evaluation of the Microcirculation in Patients with Systemic Sclerosis

Abstract

Objectives. To investigate consistency between eye sign and nailfold video capillaroscopy (NVC) in systemic sclerosis (SSc) patients and to evaluate eye sign with various parameters of disease and potential pulmonary involvement. Methods. A total of 60 SSc patients and 20 healthy individuals were enrolled. 20 SSc patients were complicated with pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH); 20 SSc patients with interstitial lung diseases (ILD); 20 SSc patients without pulmonary involvement. All subjects were assessed using the methods of NVC and eye sign. Skin involvement was evaluated by modified Rodnan skin score (mRSS) and disease activity according to Medsger’s severity score (MSS). Clinical manifestations and the presence of autoantibodies were carefully recorded. Any correlations between were evaluated with the Spearman correlation coefficient test. Results. According to the morphological changes revealed by NVC, 3 types of NVC patterns have been characterized (early pattern, active pattern, and late pattern). Eye sign showed distinguishing morphologic changes in three patterns of NVC and pulmonary involvements (PAH vs ILD) in SSc. A positive linear correlation was found between scores of eye sign and NVC in all patients with SSc (r = 0.629, P = 0.001 ). A positive correlation of eye sign was found in all SSc patients with mRSS (r = 0.748, P = 0.045 ) and MSS (r = 0.636, P = 0.001 ). Conclusions. The study demonstrates that eye sign had a high consistency with NVC for the evaluation of the microcirculation in SSc patients and exhibited specific patterns in the early, active, and late phases of SSc. Eye sign can be used as a reliable method to classify and monitor SSc patients and replace the measurement of NVC.

Eye signs as a novel risk predictor in pulmonary arterial hypertension associated with systemic lupus erythematosus

“…Copared to conjunctival microcirlation examination, the detection of the eye signs is more simple, as they can be observed using a conventional slit lamp or even with the naked eye. Clinical validation of eye signs demonstrates their high accuracy in assessing thrombosis or hypercoagulability, exhibiting a strong correspondence with nailfold capillary microcirculation [25].…”

Retracted: Eye Sign is an Alternative for Evaluation of the Microcirculation in Patients with Systemic Sclerosis

“…This article has been retracted by Hindawi following an investigation undertaken by the publisher [ 1 ]. This investigation has uncovered evidence of one or more of the following indicators of systematic manipulation of the publication process: Discrepancies in scope Discrepancies in the description of the research reported Discrepancies between the availability of data and the research described Inappropriate citations Incoherent, meaningless and/or irrelevant content included in the article Peer-review manipulation …”

“…Tis article has been retracted by Hindawi following an investigation undertaken by the publisher [1]. Tis investigation has uncovered evidence of one or more of the following indicators of systematic manipulation of the publication process:…”