The correlation of visual function with posterior retinal structure in severe retinopathy of prematurity. Cryotherapy for Retinopathy of Prematurity Cooperative Group
W. S. Gilbert, V. Dobson, G. E. Quinn, J. Reynolds, B. Tung and J. T. Flynn
Department of Ophthalmology, Children's National Medical Center, Washington, DC.
The Multicenter Trial of Cryotherapy for Retinopathy of Prematurity
previously reported reduced incidence of both poor structural and
functional outcomes after cryotherapy. We compared the results in 304 eyes
of patients in the randomized portion of the trial in whom both structural
and functional assessments were performed 12 months after randomization.
Two hundred fifty-five eyes (83.9%) had concordant outcomes: 153 eyes had
favorable structural and functional outcomes and 102 eyes had unfavorable
structural and functional outcomes. Twenty-nine eyes (9.5%) had discordant
outcomes: 20 eyes had favorable structural and unfavorable functional
outcomes and nine eyes had unfavorable structural and favorable functional
outcomes. The small number of discordant outcomes could generally be
accounted for by three factors: (1) retinal abnormalities beyond those
considered in the photographic grading system (12 eyes), (2) nonretinal
visual pathway disease (five eyes), or (3) false-positive and
false-negative results in the measurement systems used to evaluate
structure and function (five eyes). In 20 eyes (6.6%), photographs could
not be graded or the visual acuity was untestable. We conclude that the
appearance of the posterior pole of the eye correlates well with grating
acuity in the 12-month-old infant with a history of severe retinopathy of
prematurity.
