AI Article Synopsis

  • - The study investigates how COVID-19 affects the cornea and anterior segment of the eye by comparing corneal endothelial cell morphology and various eye measurements in recovered COVID-19 patients versus healthy individuals.
  • - Key findings indicate that the COVID-19 group had lower endothelial cell density and higher variability in cell size, suggesting potential damage to the cornea, while other anterior segment parameters did not show significant differences.
  • - The research highlights the need for further understanding of COVID-19's impact on eye health, given the observed changes in corneal characteristics among those who had the virus.

Article Abstract

Background: The ocular manifestations of the 2019 novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vary from acute follicular, pseudomembranous, and hemorrhagic conjunctivitis to keratoconjunctivitis with subepithelial infiltrates and dendritic lesions. Similar to other respiratory viruses, such as adenoviruses, it is thought that COVID-19 may impact the cornea. However, its impact on the cornea and anterior segment parameters are currently poorly understood.

Objective: This study aims to assess the corneal endothelial cell morphology and anterior segment parameters in patients who have recovered from COVID-19.

Methods: In this cross-sectional study, the COVID-19 group comprised 34 patients who had been diagnosed with and recovered from COVID-19, while the control group comprised age- and sex-matched individuals without any systemic or ocular diseases. The endothelial cell density (ECD), coefficient of variation (CV) of cell area, hexagonal cell percentage (HEX), anterior chamber depth (ACD), central corneal thickness (CCT), horizontal anterior chamber diameter (HACD), iridocorneal angle (ICA), horizontal visible iris diameter (HVID), pupillary diameter (PD), and keratometry values (K1 and K2) were analyzed for each participant. The differences in each of these between the groups were analyzed using either an independent samples test or a Mann-Whitney test based on the normality of the data.

Results: Regarding corneal endothelial cell morphology, the ECDs for the COVID-19 and control groups were 2278.50 ± 186.78 cells/mm and 2420.15 ± 222.25 cells/mm, respectively ( = 0.002). A significant increase was noted in CV values in the COVID-19 group compared with the control group ( < 0.001). The HEX values for the COVID-19 and control groups were 56.26 ± 5.75 and 61.50 ± 3.63, respectively ( < 0.001). Regarding the anterior segment parameters, no significant differences were observed between the groups ( > 0.05).

Conclusions: It was hypothesized that individuals who had recovered from COVID-19 would demonstrate a reduction in their endothelial functional preserves. A decrease in ECD and HEX and an increase in CV were observed in the individuals during their early post-recovery period from COVID-19.

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Source
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9092573PMC
http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/25158414221096057DOI Listing

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