• Hyewon Chung, Jong-Uk Hwang, June-Gone Kim, and Young Hee Yoon.
• Department of Ophthalmology, Asan Medical Center, University of Ulsan, College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea.
• Retina (Philadelphia, Pa.). 2006 Oct 1; 26 (8): 922-7.

PurposeTo identify cystoid macular edema (CME) in patients with retinitis pigmentosa (RP) using optical coherence tomography (OCT) and to evaluate response to acetazolamide by serial OCT.MethodsTwenty-nine consecutive RP patients were included in the study. Patients with CME were treated with acetazolamide (125 or 250 mg/d for 4-12 months). OCT, fluorescein angiography, and determination of best-corrected visual acuity (BCVA) were performed initially and throughout the follow-up period.ResultsTen of the 29 patients had CME by OCT. Of these 10 patients, 5 had various degrees of fluorescein leakage by fluorescein angiography. After acetazolamide treatment, six patients had significant decreases in macular edema in at least one eye by follow-up OCT. In six patients, visual acuity improved by > or =1 line in at least one eye. The change of central foveal thickness shown by OCT was significantly correlated with the change of logMAR of BCVA (Pearson correlation coefficient [r] = 0.576; P = 0.008). We observed no differences in the change of central foveal thickness by OCT (Mann-Whitney test; P = 1.000) and in the change of logMAR of BCVA (Mann-Whitney test; P = 0.106) between patients treated with 125 mg/d acetazolamide and those treated with 250 mg/d acetazolamide.ConclusionsThese results indicate that OCT is a valuable tool in the detection and follow-up of CME in RP patients. Treatment with acetazolamide resulted in marked improvement in OCT-diagnosed CME in RP, but visual improvement was variable.

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