In vivo confocal microscopy of corneal endothelium in patients with retinitis pigmentosa.

OBJECTIVE To evaluate corneal endothelium in patients with retinitis pigmentosa using confocal microscopy, and compare their results with those of healthy controls. METHODS This comparative study took place between June 2009 and June 2011 in the Department of Ophthalmology, Selcuk University Faculty of Medicine, Konya, Turkey. We evaluated both eyes of 17 patients with retinitis pigmentosa (group 1), and the eyes of 17 age- and gender- matched control subjects (group 2). Corneal endothelium of all participants was evaluated using confocal microscopy (ConfoScan 3, Nidek Co. Ltd, Osaka, Japan). Endothelial cell density, polymegethism, and pleomorphism values were noted. Mann-Whitney U test was used to compare the results of these 2 groups. RESULTS The values for mean endothelial cell density was 2440 +/- 451 cell/mm2 (range: 1438-3037 cell/mm2), 48.3% +/- 8.3 (range: 35.9-81.3%) for polymegethism, and 40.3% +/- 6.8 (range 24.7-53.8%) for pleomorphism in group 1; while in group 2, these values were 2344 +/- 317 cell/mm2 (range: 1445-2903 cell/mm2) for the mean endothelial cell density, 45.3% +/- 9.2 (range: 26.5-80.2%) for polymegethism, and 42.4% +/- 5.3 (range between 24.8-49.5%) for pleomorphism. No statistically significant difference was found between endothelial cell density (p=0.15), polymegethism (p=0.15), and pleomorphism (p=0.16) values of the 2 groups. CONCLUSION The endothelial cell density, polymegethism and pleomorphism values in patients with retinitis pigmentosa do not differ from those of healthy individuals. Since retinitis pigmentosa is a heterogeneous group of diseases, further studies with larger number and more homogeneous groups of patients are needed.