OUR EXPERIENCE WITH LASER PHOTOCOAGULATION IN DIABETIC MACULAR OEDEMA

Diabetic macular oedema, focal or diffuse, is primarily responsible for visual loss in cases of diabetic retinopathy. When to start photocoagulation in such cases has often been debatable. Over a 3 year period, 80 eyes of 80 patients were subjected to argon green macular grid photocoagulation in a randomized clinical study keeping the other eye (80 eyes) as controls in patients with diabetic macular oedema. It was observed that in 5 per cent of such eyes the vision did improve while in 6.3 per cent of patients deterioration of vision was present as compared to 16.3 per cent in control group. It is concluded that laser photocoagulation has a definite role in arresting the progression of diabetic maculopathy and early intervention should be resorted to in case of clinically significant macular oedema.