Smartphone Camera to Image the Retina for Primary Care MDs and Diabetologists

Abstract

Background: Imaging is an important tool for diagnosis of hypertension and diabetes for all physicians. In the US, 300 million smartphones were purchased in 2019. Purpose: A smartphone-based ophthalmoscope for fundus imaging was compared to an office based retina camera to evaluate the average time spent on each device. Methods: Inclusion criteria: Patients with 20/20-20/50 vision, informed consent was obtained. D-Eye/iphone digital direct ophthalmoscope (Padova, Italy) was used on the dilated and undilated eyes of patients, video recorded to attain an image of the optic nerve and internally timed in the iPhone. Optos (Marlborough, MA) was then used to take retinal images of both dilated and undilated eyes of patients for comparison. The start time and end time was recorded from the timestamp of the 1st and last image taken on Optos, then the difference between both timestamps was calculated to obtain time spent on Optos. Results: For dilated patients (n=12, 24 eyes), the average time taken to obtain a clear video of both eyes using D-Eye was 28.08 seconds. The average time to take images of both eyes using Optos was 1.83 minutes. For undilated patients (n=10, 20 eyes), the average time of a clear video of both eyes using D-Eye was 29.8 seconds. The average time to take clear images of both eyes using Optos was 1.2 minutes. Conclusion: The portable D-Eye attachment may be useful at primary care settings, eye MD offices, bedside, ER, and wheelchair patients for evaluation and diagnosis. The D-Eye attachment for the smartphone is useful for imaging both dilated and undilated eyes. We look forward to future studies of the D-Eye for more complex retinal images.