Ocular findings and blood flow in patients with Takayasu arteritis: a cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Takayasu arteritis (TAK) is a chronic granulomatous vasculitis that can lead to ischaemic ocular complications. We aimed to document ocular complications, ocular blood flow and the association of them with systemic clinical findings in TAK.

MATERIAL AND METHODS: We included 65 patients with TAK (60 female, 5 male, mean age: 41.8±12.9 years) and 30 healthy subjects (30 female, mean age: 39.0±7.5 years) in this study. All of the patients had a detailed rheumatological and ophthalmological evaluation. Ocular blood flow in ophthalmic artery (OA) and central retinal artery (CRA) was evaluated with colour Doppler ultrasonography.

RESULTS: Hypertensive retinopathy was observed in 33.9%, and Takayasu retinopathy was observed in 6.2% of patients. Posterior subcapsular cataracts or a history of cataract surgery was seen in 15.4% of the cases. None of the patients experienced visual loss due to ischaemic or neovascular complications. Patients with TAK had increased resistivity index (RI) in ophthalmic artery (0.75 vs 0.66, p=0.002) and CRA (0.75 vs 0.67, p=0.001). Patients with hypertensive retinopathy had significantly longer disease duration (p=0.016). Ophthalmic artery RI was significantly higher in patients with ipsilateral radial artery pulselessness compared with patients without (0.77 vs 0.68, p=0.031).

CONCLUSION: This study reported the lowest prevalence of Takayasu retinopathy and is the only series without permanent visual loss. We documented for the first time that radial artery pulselessness can predict reduction of ipsilateral ocular perfusion. We believe that better management of TAK with current medications reduced ocular complication rates.