Ocular Surface Temperature Profile of Eyes with Retinal Vein Occlusion

Retinal vein occlusion (RVO) results in ischemia followed by an inflammatory response. Both processes affect tissue temperature in opposite directions. Here, we evaluate the effect of RVO on the ocular surface temperature (OST) profile. Subjects with RVO were prospectively recruited. Healthy subjects without any ocular disease served as controls. The OST was determined using the Therm-App thermal imaging camera, and image processing software was employed to compute the mean temperature values of the medial canthus, lateral canthus, and cornea. We obtained thermographic images from 30 RVO subjects (30 eyes) and 148 controls (148 eyes). A univariate analysis found that eyes with RVO had significantly elevated OSTs compared to the controls (mean difference of 0.6 +/- 0.3 Celsius, p < 0.05). However, this distinction between the groups lost statistical significance upon adjusting for possible confounders, including patient and environmental factors. These findings were confirmed with a post hoc case-control matched comparison. In conclusion, RVO does not seem to affect the OST. This might be due to the balance between inflammatory thermogenesis and heat constriction from ischemia in RVO. It is also possible that, in our cohort, the RVO pathophysiological processes involved were localized and did not extend to the anterior segment. Patient and environmental factors must be considered when interpreting the OST.