Journal of Alzheimers Disease & Parkinsonism
Open Access

Commentary

Retinal and Optic Disc Alterations in Alzheimer's Disease: the Eye as a Potential Central Nervous System Window

Maria P Bambo^1,2, Elena Garcia-Martin^1,2*, Jose M Larrosa^1,2, Vicente Polo^1,2, Fernando Gutiérrez-Ruiz^1,2, Vilades², Laura Gil-Arribas^1,2 and Luis E Pablo^1,2

¹Ophthalmology Department, Miguel Servet University Hospital, Zaragoza, Spain

²Aragon Institute for Health Research (IIS Aragon), University of Zaragoza, Zaragoza, Spain

Corresponding Author:

Elena Garcia-Martin
C/ Padre Arrupe. Consultas Externas de Oftalmologia 50009-Zaragoza, Spain
Tel: 0034-976765558
E-mail: egmvivax@yahoo.com

Received date: March 09, 2016; Accepted date: March 14, 2016; Published date: March 21, 2016

Citation: Bambo MP, Garcia-Martin E, Larrosa JM, Polo V, Gutiérrez-Ruiz F, et al. (2016) Retinal and Optic Disc Alterations in Alzheimer’s Disease: the Eye as a Potential Central Nervous System Window. J Alzheimers Dis Parkinsonism 6:223. doi: 10.4172/2161-0460.1000223

Copyright: © 2016 Bambo MP, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Pathologic changes in the retina and optic nerve are observed in patients with Alzheimer´s disease (AD), even in early stages of the dementia. In our clinical ophthalmology practice, we use optical coherence tomography (OCT), a noninvasive, rapid, objective, and reliable technology that enables for quantification of the retinal nerve fiber layer (RNFL), namely the retinal ganglion cell axons that eventually form the optic nerve. The opportunity to analyze a part of the central nervous system by such a simple exploration led to several studies demonstrating thinning of the RNFL and central retina in AD patients compared with healthy subjects. Here we present some of our investigations in AD patients using Spectral Domain-OCT. Our results suggest that axonal loss secondary to pathologic alterations in the brains of AD patients can be observed by OCT. We also analyzed the association between retinal and RNFL thicknesses and neurologic characteristics, disease duration and severity, and found that mean RNFL thickness was significantly correlated with disease duration, indicating that the progression of AD is associated with a progressive loss of ganglion cells.

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