Intracranial artery stenosis is associated with retinal arteriolar deficit

作者：Le Cao, Hang Wang, Zhouwei Xiong, William Robert Kwapong, Yuying Yan, Jinkui Hao, Guina Liu, Yitian Zhao, Bo Wu · 发表于：Chinese Medical Journal · 年份：2025 · DOI：10.1097/cm9.0000000000003453 · 被引用次数：4 · 研究领域：Retinal and Optic Conditions、Retinal Imaging and Analysis、Ocular Diseases and Behçet’s Syndrome

To the Editor: Retinal imaging has been increasingly used as a non-invasive tool to directly evaluate subtle abnormalities of microvasculature in cerebral atherosclerosis.[1] Optical coherence tomography angiography (OCTA) is a novel ophthalmic imaging technique that provides depth-resolved visualization of retinal microvasculature with near histology-level resolution.[2] Because the retinal microvasculature shares anatomic, embryologic, and physiological characteristics with that of the cerebral microcirculation and is an extension of the internal carotid artery (ICA), changes in the retinal microvasculature may reflect changes in the cerebral microcirculation and ICA. Thus, studying the retinal microvascular changes may provide clues to understanding the pathophysiology in atherosclerosis. Using the ophthalmic artery (OA) as the pivotal point, we investigated the retinal microvascular differences using OCTA in individuals with extracranial artery stenosis (ECAS) and intracranial artery stenosis (ICAS). This was a part of a single-center, cross-sectional study in the Department of Neurology, West China Hospital, Sichuan University (ChiCTR2300074640, https://www.chictr.org.cn/hvshowproject.html?id=235032&v=1.0). Patients with unilateral severe cerebral large artery stenosis (LAS) in the anterior circulation region, whether with ischemic stroke or transient ischemic attack (TIA), were consecutively recruited from April 2021 to February 2023. The Ethics Committee West China Hos...