Solar retinopathy: Follow-up examinations with optical coherence tomography (OCT) and microperimetry

Background: Solar retinopathy is a phototoxic damage to the central retina. It may cause visual deterioration and a central scotoma with reading difficulties, that usually fade with time. Morphological and functional changes can be very subtle and are often inadequately detected by standard examinations. Patients and Methods: The more affected, left eye of a 41-year-old female patient was examinded clinically, by optical coherence tomography (OCT 3) and by MP1 - microperimetry during a 6-month follow up after gazing at a partial eclipse. Results: At all times visual acuity was reduced to 0.7 causing visual deterioration. OCT examinations showed a subfoveal damage of decreasing extent, which was still detectable after 6 months. The retinal affection resulted in a persistent microscotoma of decreasing depth. Conclusion: OCT 3 and MP I - microperimetry are able to detect the morphological and the functional damages in solar retinopathy at a level of sensitivity good enough to produce correlating results which allow the detection of subtle changes during follow-up.