Ocular microvascular alteration in Sjögren syndrome

Area of Science:

• Ophthalmology
• Rheumatology
• Medical Imaging

Background:

• Sjögren syndrome (SjS) is a systemic autoimmune disease impacting exocrine glands, including ocular ones.
• The association between ocular microvascular alterations and SjS remains unclear.
• This study investigates retinal and conjunctival microvascular changes in SjS patients.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate retinal and conjunctival microvascular alterations in Sjögren syndrome (SjS) patients.
• To assess the utility of optical coherence tomography angiography (OCTA) in detecting these changes.
• To explore correlations between retinal and conjunctival microvascular densities in SjS.

Main Methods:

• Recruited 12 SjS patients and 12 healthy controls.
• Acquired 3D conjunctival and retinal OCTA images for microvascular density analysis.
• Utilized specific retinal region segmentation and correlation analyses.

Main Results:

• SjS patients exhibited decreased superficial and deep retinal microvascular density compared to controls.
• Conjunctival microvascular density was significantly higher in SjS patients.
• A negative correlation was observed between conjunctival and retinal microvascular densities in SjS patients.

Conclusions:

• OCTA reveals distinct microvascular density changes in both retinal and conjunctival tissues in SjS.
• These findings suggest OCTA is a valuable tool for identifying ocular involvement in SjS.
• Microvascular alterations in the retina and conjunctiva are characteristic of SjS.