1Wirbelauer C., 2Winkler J., 2Scholz C., 1Häberle H., 2Bastian G. O., 1Pham D. T.

1Abteilung für Augenheilkunde, Krankenhaus Neukölln, Berlin; 2Medizinische Universität zu Lübeck

Introduction: The purpose of this study was to correlate histopathologically corneal diseases with optical coherence tomography (OCT).
Patients and Methods: Slitlamp-adapted corneal OCT was performed in 6 patients (persistent epithelial defect with corneal thinning n=2; bullous keratopathy n=2; keratoconus n=1; retrocorneal membrane n=1) immediately before a planned corneal transplantation. After the excision the specimens were fixed, stained with hematoxylin-eosin, and examined with light microscopy. The tissues were compared morphologically and analyzed morphometrically.
Results: The detected morphological changes produced either an increase or decrease in light reflectivity in corneal OCT. The most prominent changes were caused by corneal scars or edematous tissue. The morphometrical analysis with OCT revealed pathological areas ranging from 31 to 902 µm. Although the mean OCT values were up to 20% higher than the values derived from light microscopy there was a significant correlation (r=0.94; P<0.001) between corneal OCT and the histological sections.
Conclusions: The noncontact slitlamp-adapted corneal OCT revealed a good correlation with the histological sections. The differences noted were partly related to shrinking processes during preparation. OCT allows a noninvasive and precise representation of pathological structures in corneal diseases.

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