Brant Rodrigo, Nakayama Luis Filipe, de Oliveira Talita Virgínia Fernandes, de Oliveira Juliana Angelica Estevão, Ribeiro Lucas Zago, Richter Gabriela Dalmedico, Rodacki Rafael, Penha Fernando Marcondes
Ophthalmology and Visual Science Department, Sao Paulo Federal University, Sao Paulo, SP, Brazil.
Keck School of Medicine, Roski Eye Institute, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, USA.
Int J Retina Vitreous. 2024 Jun 14;10(1):43. doi: 10.1186/s40942-024-00559-z.
Diabetic retinopathy (DR) stands as the foremost cause of preventable blindness in adults. Despite efforts to expand DR screening coverage in the Brazilian public healthcare system, challenges persist due to various factors including social, medical, and financial constraints. Our objective was to evaluate the quality of images obtained with the AirDoc, a novel device, compared to Eyer portable camera which has already been clinically validated.
Images were captured by two portable retinal devices: AirDoc and Eyer. The included patients had their fundus images obtained in a screening program conducted in Blumenau, Santa Catarina. Two retina specialists independently assessed image's quality. A comparison was performed between both devices regarding image quality and the presence of artifacts.
The analysis included 129 patients (mean age of 61 years), with 29 (43.28%) male and an average disease duration of 11.1 ± 8 years. In Ardoc, 21 (16.28%) images were classified as poor quality, with 88 (68%) presenting artifacts; in Eyer, 4 (3.1%) images were classified as poor quality, with 94 (72.87%) presenting artifacts.
Although both Eyer and AirDoc devices show potential as screening tools, the AirDoc images displayed higher rates of ungradable and low-quality images, that may directly affect the DR and DME grading. We must acknowledge the limitations of our study, including the relatively small sample size. Therefore, the interpretations of our analyses should be approached with caution, and further investigations with larger patient cohorts are warranted to validate our findings.
糖尿病视网膜病变（DR）是成年人可预防失明的首要原因。尽管巴西公共医疗系统努力扩大DR筛查覆盖范围，但由于社会、医疗和经济等各种因素，挑战依然存在。我们的目标是评估一种新型设备AirDoc与已通过临床验证的Eyer便携式相机相比所获得图像的质量。
图像由两种便携式视网膜设备采集：AirDoc和Eyer。纳入的患者在圣卡塔琳娜州布卢梅瑙开展的一项筛查项目中获取了眼底图像。两位视网膜专家独立评估图像质量。对两种设备在图像质量和伪影存在情况方面进行了比较。
分析纳入了129例患者（平均年龄61岁），其中男性29例（43.28%），平均病程11.1±8年。在AirDoc设备中，21幅（16.28%）图像被归类为质量差，88幅（68%）存在伪影；在Eyer设备中，4幅（3.1%）图像被归类为质量差，94幅（72.87%）存在伪影。
尽管Eyer和AirDoc设备都显示出作为筛查工具的潜力，但AirDoc设备的图像不可分级和低质量图像的比例更高，这可能直接影响DR和糖尿病性黄斑水肿（DME）的分级。我们必须承认我们研究的局限性，包括样本量相对较小。因此，对我们分析结果的解释应谨慎对待，有必要进行更大患者队列的进一步研究以验证我们的发现。
