DOI: 10.36347/sjams.2020.v08i01.043

Pages: 224-232

Diabetes mellitus is the leading cause of blindness in the working age group; retinal neuronal abnormalities are present in early stages of Diabetes mellitus, even before the development of clinically detectable microvascular damage. With the increasing duration of DM, these abnormalities might increase leading to alteration in retinal thickness. The study was undertaken to test the hypothesis that duration and severity of diabetes affects macular thickness even in the absence of clinically apparent macular edema. We recruited 50 diagnosed patients of type-II Diabetes mellitus (NIDDM) as cases and 100 age and sex matched non-diabetic subjects attending outpatient services of department of Ophthalmology as the control group. Complete ophthalmological examination was done and measurement of retinal thickness was obtained in nine EDTRS subfields within 3 concentric circles centered on fovea making use of spectral domain Optical coherence tomography (SD-OCT). Corresponding quantitative data (µ±SD) was compared using chi square test and one-way analysis of variance. Significantly decreased macular thickness and volume was found in diabetics in comparison to the control group in outer and inner nasal and superior quadrant. This decrease in macular thickness in the specific quadrant also significantly increased with decrease in control of disease i.e. increase in HbA1c value more than 7%. Duration of disease more than 10 years was the only factor which resulted in decreased thickness of the central fovea. Our study detected morphological changes in NIDDM patients with the help of SD-OCT signifying that neural tissue loss begins in the early stages of diabetes and warrants early neuroprotective measures to prevent the damage. SD-OCT may represent an effective tool for identifying early signs of neurodegeneration in diabetic patients.