Quantitative Assessment of Retinal Capillary Vessel Density and Foveal Avascular Zone Area in Central Serous Chorioretinopathy Using OCTA

Purpose: To quantitatively assess the retinal capillary vessel density (VD) and foveal avascular zone (FAZ) area in acute and chronic central serous chorioretinopathy (CSC) patients compared to healthy subjects using optical coherence tomography angiography (OCTA) and determine their correlation with visual acuity (VA). Methods: This was a cross-sectional, case-control study. All subjects were divided into three groups: acute CSC, chronic CSC, and healthy controls. The best-corrected VA test, optical coherence tomography, and OCTA were performed on the same day. In this study, we recorded and compared the main data of FAZ and VD in 3 × 3 mm OCTA images among three groups, also calculated the correlation between OCTA variables and VA in CSC patients. Results: A total of 148 subjects (148 eyes) were included in this study, with 50 eyes in acute CSC, 48 eyes in chronic CSC, and 50 eyes in control groups. The mean age was 50.11 ± 8.14 years. Chronic CSC had the significantly lowest VD both on the superficial and deep retina and the largest FAZ (0.39 ± 0.13 mm2) compared to acute CSC and controls (all p < 0.05). There was no statistical difference between acute CSC and controls on VD or FAZ (both p > 0.05). In chronic CSC, both the decreased VD on deep retina and expanded FAZ were correlated with a worse VA (both p < 0.05). Conclusions: OCTA could serve as a reliable tool to evaluate different courses of CSC quantitively. In 3 × 3 mm OCTA images, both decreased VD and expanded FAZ were observed in chronic CSC patients.