Clinical Study
Eye (2005) 19, 159–162. doi:10.1038/sj.eye.6701434 Published online 18 June 2004
Pulsatile ocular blood flow in patients with Graves' ophthalmopathy
None of the authors have any commercial interest in the material mentioned herein.
Chieh-Chih Tsai1,2,3, Hui-Chuan Kau3,4, Shu-Ching Kao1,2, Ming-Wei Lin3, Wen-Ming Hsu1,2, Jorn-Hon Liu2,5 and Yau-Huei Wei6
- 1Department of Ophthalmology, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, Taiwan, ROC
- 2School of Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, Taiwan, ROC
- 3Institute of Clinical Medicine, National Yang-Ming University, Taiwan, ROC
- 4Department of Ophthalmology, Taoyuan Veterans Hospital, Taiwan, ROC
- 5Department of Ophthalmology, Cheng Hsin Rehabilitation Medical Center Taiwan, ROC
- 6Department of Biochemistry and Center for Cellular and Molecular Biology, National Yang-Ming University, Taiwan, ROC
Correspondence: C-C Tsai, Department of Ophthalmology, Taipei Veterans General Hospital, No. 201 Sec. 2, Shih-Pai Road, Taiwan, Taipei, ROC. Tel: +886 2 2 8757325; Fax: +886 2 28213984; E-mail: cctsai@vghtpe.gov.tw
Received 9 May 2003; Accepted 29 December 2003; Published online 18 June 2004.
Abstract
Purpose
Graves' ophthalmopathy (GO) is a cosmetically disfiguring and vision-threatening complication of Graves' disease (GD). We investigated the clinical application of pulsatile ocular blood flow (POBF) measurement for detection of clinically active GO.
Methods
In this prospective study, the OBF tonometer (OBF Labs, Wiltshire, UK) was used to measure POBF in 83 eyes of 83 patients with GD in two groups and 42 normal control subjects. Group A comprised 35 GD patients without ophthalmopathy, and group B composed 48 GD patients with ophthalmopathy. Results were compared with controls.
Results
Pulse amplitude, pulse volume, and POBF were significantly lower in group B than that in group A and controls (P<0.001). After adjusting for age, sex, systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, heart rate, intraocular pressure, and axial length, multivariate linear regression analysis showed that POBF was still significantly lower in eyes with GO (772.4 (SD 279.3) 
l/min) than group A (1177.3 (SD 326.3) l/min) and controls (1255.4 (SD 295.1) l/min) (P<0.001).
Conclusions
These data show that the pulsatile ocular blood flow differences between the groups are relevant to the presence of GO. POBF measurement is a clinically useful adjunct for assessing the haemodynamic change in GO patients.
Keywords:
Graves' disease, ophthalmopathy, pulsatile
