Study of retinal nerve fiber layer in obstructive sleep apnea syndrome patients.

Purpose To evaluate the peripapillary retinal nerve fiber layer (RNFL) thickness obtained with spectral‐domain optical coherence tomography (OCT) in obstructive sleep apnea syndrome (OSA) patients, as a biological marker of neuronal damage. Methods Sixty‐four OSA patients and one hundred twenty‐nine healthy controls were prospectively selected. Only one eye per subject was randomly chosen. AOS patients were classified in three groups according to apnea/hipopnea index: mild, moderate and severe. All participants had intraocular pressure less than 21 mmHg and performed at least a reliable standard automated perimetry (SAP). Peripapillary RNFL thicknesses were measured with Cirrus OCT (Carl Zeiss Meditec, Dublin, Ca). After checking for a normal distribution of variables, differences between both groups were tested by Student t test. Results Age was 50.6 ± 9.3 years in control eyes and 47.8 ± 11.5 years in AOS patients (p = 0.09). Mean deviation of SAP was ‐0.50 ± 1.0 dB and ‐1.4± 2.3 dB, in control and AOS patients, respectively (p<0.001). Pattern standard deviation and Visual Field Index (VFI) of SAP were also different between both groups. The RNFL thickness at 7 o'clock position and the average RNFL thickness had lower thicknesses in AOS patients compared to healthy individuals Conclusion OCT detected a mild reduction of RNFL thickness in AOS patients compared with healthy subjects. Visual field indices were also different between both groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]