Longitudinal Changes of Bruch's Membrane Opening, Anterior Scleral Canal Opening, and Border Tissue in Experimental Juvenile High Myopia

Author(s): Mahmoud T KhalafAllah (1,2), Preston A Fuchs (3), Fred Nugen (3), Mustapha El Hamdaoui (3), Alexander Levy (4), David T Redden (5), Brian C Samuels (3), Rafael Grytz (3)

1 Vision Science Graduate Program, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama, United States.
2 Department of Ophthalmology, Menoufia University, Shebin Elkom, Menoufia, Egypt.
3 Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Sciences, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama, United States.
4 Department of Biomedical Engineering, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama, United States.
5 Department of Biostatistics, The University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama, United States.

PURPOSE: To investigate the relative positional changes between the Bruch's membrane opening (BMO) and the anterior scleral canal opening (ASCO), and border tissue configuration changes during experimental high myopia development in juvenile tree shrews.

METHODS: Juvenile tree shrews were assigned randomly to two groups: binocular normal vision (n = 9) and monocular -10 D lens treatment starting at 24 days of visual experience to induce high myopia in one eye while the other eye served as control (n = 12). Refractive and biometric measurements were obtained daily, and 48 radial optical coherence tomography B-scans through the center of the optic nerve head were obtained weekly for 6 weeks. ASCO and BMO were segmented manually after nonlinear distortion correction.

RESULTS: Lens-treated eyes developed high degree of axial myopia (-9.76 ± 1.19 D), significantly different (P < 0.001) from normal (0.34 ± 0.97 D) and control eyes (0.39 ± 0.88 D). ASCO-BMO centroid offset gradually increased and became significantly larger in the experimental high myopia group compared with normal and control eyes (P < 0.0001) with an inferonasal directional preference. The border tissue showed a significantly higher tendency of change from internally to externally oblique configuration in the experimental high myopic eyes in four sectors: nasal, inferonasal, inferior, and inferotemporal (P < 0.005).

CONCLUSIONS: During experimental high myopia development, progressive relative deformations of ASCO and BMO occur simultaneously with changes in border tissue configuration from internally to externally oblique in sectors that are close to the posterior pole (nasal in tree shrews). These asymmetric changes may contribute to pathologic optic nerve head remodeling and an increased risk of glaucoma later in life.

Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci. 2023 Apr 3;64(4):2. doi: 10.1167/iovs.64.4.2.

PMID: 37010856 PMCID: PMC10080949 DOI: 10.1167/iovs.64.4.2

Tip of the Month manager: Anthony Khawaja
Tip of the Month editorial board: Francisco Goni, Karl Mercieca, Humma Shahid
Tip of the Month editors in chief: Manuele Michelessi, Francesco Oddone