Abstract:

Objective To study the clinical characteristics and causes of laser-induced maculopathy． Design Retrospective case series. Participants Nineteen patients (22 eyes) with decreased visual acuity due to laser injury were recruited into the study between April 2009 to December 2015． Methods  All patients underwent routine examination，fundus photography and optical coherence tomography (OCT)． Main Outcome Measures Morphic characteristics of laser-induced maculopathy, the reasons of laser injury. Results Laser-induced maculopathy included retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) and ellipsoid layer disruption (13 eyes, 59.1%), macular hole (5 eyes, 22.7%), macular edema with inner retinal hemorrhage (3 eyes, 13.6%) and focal macular detachment (1 eye, 4.5%). The reasons of  the injuries included lacking supervision (8 eyes, 42.1%), ignorance of laser harm (8 eyes, 42.1%), damage due to misoperation of laser instrument (3 eyes, 15.8%). Conclusion There are various patterns of laser-induced maculopathy. The outer retina was the most frequently damaged region after laser exposure. Education of laser harm is the key point to avoid laser-induced maculopathy.

Key words: laser, maculopathy, optical coherence tomography