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Abstract
Background Ocular involvement is a common and serious manifestation of Behçet's disease (BD). It occurs in about 70% of the patients and is associated with a high risk of blindness (Kaçmaz et al., 2008).
Color Doppler is used for imaging retrobulbar vasculature. It measures the peak systolic velocity (PSV) and end diastolic velocity (EDV), from which the resistance index (RI) is calculated in the ophthalmic artery (OA), central retinal artery (CRA), and posterior ciliary artery (PCA) to detect any abnormality in the retrobulbar vessels (Nagaoka, 2006).
Objectives To determine and compare the orbital Color Doppler haemodynamic parameters of Behçet's patients with those of healthy subjects and to evaluate the OA, CRA, PCA flow velocities and resistance indices (RIs).
Methods This study included thirty patients suffering from Behçet's disease satisfying at least 3 of the criteria of BD according to the International Study Group for Behçet's disease in 1990. 20 age/sex-matched healthy subjects served as a control group. All patients were subjected to history taking, clinical examination, full ophthalmological examination, routine laboratory investigations and Color Doppler ultrasound (CDU) examination.
Results The patients' age ranged from 18 to 45 years with a mean of 31.0±7.5. Their disease duration ranged from 0.25 to 20 years with a mean of 5.71±5.84. There were diminished blood flow velocities of the OA, CRA and PCA as the peak systolic velocity (PSV) and end diastolic velocity (EDV) of these arteries were lower than normal while resistance flow indices (RIs) were higher than normal.
Results of ocular Doppler ultrasound over right (RT) and left (LT) sided arteries
Conclusions Behçet's disease patients with ocular involvement have lower CRA, PCA and OA blood flow velocities than healthy control. CDU is helpful in early diagnosis of ocular Behçet's disease activity as it is a widely used, easy-to-perform and accurate method.
References
Kaçmaz O., Kempen J.H., Newcomb C., Gangaputra S., Daniel E., et al.(2008): The Systemic Immunosuppressive Therapy for Eye Diseases: Cohort Study Group. Am J Ophthalmol; 146(6): 828–836.
Nagaoka T. (2006): Physiological mechanism for the regulation of ocular circulation: Nippon Ganka Gakkai Zasshi. 110 (11): 872–8.
The International Study Group for Behçet's disease (1990): Criteria for diagnosis of Behçet's disease. Lancet; 335:1078–1080.
References
Disclosure of Interest None declared