Effect of oral prednisolone on visual outcomes and complications after scleral buckling

To evaluate the effect of oral prednisolone on visual outcomes and complications of scleral buckling (SB) in phakic eyes with acute rhegmatogenous retinal detachment (RRD).

In a randomized double-blind placebo-controlled trial, patients with acute RRD underwent SB. The treatment group received 1 mg/kg oral prednisolone for 10 days while the control group received placebo. Outcome measures included visual acuity (VA), retinal redetachment (re-RD), cystoid macular edema (CME), proliferative vitreoretinopathy (PVR), and other possible postoperative complications. Outcome measures were compared between groups with McNemar test.

Overall, 52 eyes of 52 subjects were enrolled into the study, which included 25 and 27 eyes in the treatment and placebo groups, respectively. Preoperatively, the extent and location of RD and rate of hypotony was comparable between the study groups. VA improvement (logMAR) was 0.75+/-0.61 overall: 0.85+/-0.62 in the treatment group versus 0.65+/-0.61 in the placebo group (p=0.36). Postoperative complications in the treatment and placebo groups included choroidal detachment, 3 versus 4 eyes (p=0.45), significant PVR, 1 versus 3 (p=0.33), and CME, 3 versus 5 eyes (p=0.39), respectively.

Postoperative oral prednisolone does not seem to improve the visual outcomes and complications of scleral buckling in simple phakic RRD.