The Use of Optical Coherence Tomography and Electrophysiological Tests in the Early Diagnosis of Inflammatory Changes in the CNS in children with ASD—A Review of Contemporary Literature

Abstract

This article is a review of the contemporary literature on the possibility of using modern ophthalmological diagnostics, such as optical coherence tomography and electrophysiological tests, in the assessment of changes in eyesight correlating with inflammatory changes in the central nervous system (CNS) as one of the risk factors for neurodevelopmental disorders in children with ASD. A significant role is attributed to the activation of nerve and glial cells, as well as inflammatory changes in the brain, both of which can be of great importance in regard to an autism development predisposition. This fact indicates the possibility of using certain ophthalmic markers to depict an early correlation between the CNS and its outermost layer, i.e., the retina. A comprehensive ophthalmological assessment, and above all, characteristic changes in the functional function of photoreceptors and disorders of the structures of the retina or optic nerve fibers found in the latest OCT or ERG tests may in the future become diagnostic tools, further confirming the early characteristics of autism in children and adolescents. The above information, therefore, emphasizes the importance of cooperation between specialists in improving the diagnosis and treatment of children with autism.

Retinal electrophysiology in central nervous system disorders. A review of human and mouse studies

“…Other areas of signal analysis are still to be explored such as variable frequency complex demodulation that provides a high resolution spectral analysis of waveforms ( Wang et al, 2006 ), or a functional data analytical approach where the ERG waveforms could be analyzed as a series of datapoints to identify differences in location scale or shape of the waveforms ( Ramsay, 1982 ; Ramsay and Dalzell, 1991 ; Ramsay and Silverman, 2005 ). These additional mathematical approaches to signal analysis, in combination with phenotypic or other neurobiological markers, may provide the necessary fidelity for more accurate earlier diagnoses and provide more targeted interventions and better prognoses for neurological conditions ( Dacquino et al, 2015 ; Clementz et al, 2016 ; Barth et al, 2018 ; Liang et al, 2020 ; Modrzejewska and Bosy-Gąsior, 2023 ).…”