Vitreous Hyper-Reflective Dots in Optical Coherence Tomography and Retinal Tear in Patients with Acute Posterior Vitreous Detachment

ABSTRACT

Purpose: To report the presence of hyper-reflective dots in the vitreous cavity using spectral-domain optical coherence tomography (SD-OCT) in patients with acute symptomatic posterior vitreous detachment (PVD) and investigate their association with the presence of retinal tear.

Methods: The medical records of 77 patients with acute symptomatic PVD, who were examined between March 2013 and February 2015, were reviewed. The severity of vitreous hyper-reflective dots (VHDs) was graded using SD-OCT images, and the presence of retinal tear was assessed.

Results: Forty-one (53.2%) eyes had mild VHDs, 13 (16.9%) eyes had moderate VHDs, and 14 (18.2%) eyes had severe VHDs. Retinal tear was found in 21 (27.3%) eyes. The presence of severe VHDs was associated with an increased likelihood of retinal tear (positive likelihood ratio, 9.78; 95% confidence interval, 3.02–31.63). In 14 (66.7%) eyes with retinal tear, the mean number of VHDs significantly decreased from 23.2 ± 20.27 to 2.3 ± 2.66 at a mean follow-up interval of 2.8 ± 1.48 weeks (P = 0.002).

Conclusions: The presence of severe VHDs is suggestive of retinal tear in patients with acute symptomatic PVD. However, this SD-OCT finding should be limited to the acute phase of PVD.

KEYWORDS:

• Optical coherence tomography
• posterior vitreous detachment
• retinal break
• retinal tear
• vitreous hyper-reflective dots

Declaration of interest

The authors report no conflicts of interest. The authors alone are responsible for the content and writing of the paper.

Funding

This study was supported by a grant from the Dongguk University Research Fund of 2014 (J.H.O.). The funding organization had no role in the design or conduct of this research.

Supplemental Material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed on the publisher’s website.

Additional information

Funding

This study was supported by a grant from the Dongguk University Research Fund of 2014 (J.H.O.). The funding organization had no role in the design or conduct of this research.