Visual Deficits in Diabetic Retinal Disease

To demonstrate the current level of visual deficits due to DRD.

This cross-sectional study used the Sight Outcomes Research Collaborative (SOURCE) repository to identify all patients with DRD, diabetic macular edema (DME), and proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR). Cohorts for each disease state were created using ICD10 codes based on the first date of diagnosis. Patients had their vision assessed at the index date, then, when available, at years 1,2,3, and 5. The primary outcome was the percentage of eyes with vision deficits to the level of 20/70 and 20/200 or worse.

Overall, 33,888, 7609, and 11,923 eyes were included for analysis in the DRD (18426 patients), DME (4345), and PDR (6507) cohorts, respectively. At the first presentation, 16.7% and 8.3% of DRD eyes had vision ≤20/70 and ≤20/200, respectively. These percentages decreased over the next 5 years (5-year ≤20/70 VA = 9.8%, 5-year ≤20/200 VA = 3.8%). The percent of eyes with DME and ≤20/70 vision decreased from 16.2% to 11.5% at 1 year but increased to 12.9% at year 2 before ending at 12.1% in year 5. DME eyes with ≤20/200 vision also decreased from 4.8% to 3.6% before increasing again through year 5 (5.0%). PDR eyes with ≤20/70 vision started at 34.5% but decreased each observation to a low of 18.4% at year 5. Similar improvement was seen in PDR with ≤20/200 vision starting at 19.7% and decreased at each observation until year 5 (8.0%).

Visual deficits due to DRD remain a significant concern.