The study, published in the online edition of Neurology last month, suggests that retinal thinning, measured by OCT, may occur at higher rates in people with earlier and more active MS.
For the study, 164 people with MS, including 59 who had no disease activity, underwent eye scans that measured thinning of a portion of their retinas every six months for an average of 21 months.
Participants with MS relapses had 42 per cent faster thinning than people with MS who had no relapses.
Participants with MS relapses had 42 per cent faster thinning than people with MS who had no relapses…
People whose level of disability worsened during the study experienced 37 per cent more thinning than those who had no changes in their level of disability, and those who had the disease less than five years showed 43 per cent faster thinning than those who had the disease more than five years.
“As more therapies are developed to slow the progression of MS, testing retinal thinning in the eyes may be helpful in evaluating how effective those therapies are,” said study author Dr. Peter Calabresi, from the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore.
