Incidence and natural course of symptomatic central serous chorioretinopathy in pregnant women in a maternity hospital in Kuwait

Abstract

PURPOSE: To report the incidence, clinical features and natural course of central serous chorioretinopathy (CSR) in pregnant women in Kuwait. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Patients were actively recruited from a private maternity hospital. Out of the 17,000 pregnant women who visited the antenatal care clinics (Al-Orf Hospital, Kuwait) over 3 years, 900 had visual complaints. Patients with visual complaints underwent complete ophthalmological assessment. Medical records of patients with CSR were reviewed, and a full clinical ophthalmological assessment was performed including measurement of best corrected visual acuity, intraocular pressure, slit lamp biomicroscopy, dilated indirect ophthalmoscopy and Amsler grid screening, color and red free fundus photography and retinal optical coherence tomography. All patients were evaluated throughout the course of pregnancy and for 6 months after delivery. RESULTS: Four patients had CSR among the 17,000 pregnant women reviewed over 3 years corresponding to an incidence of 0.008 % per year. Two patients (50%) had CSR with white subretinal exudates and 2 (50%) had no exudates. There was complete resolution in all patients (100%) within 3 months after delivery. CONCLUSIONS: In pregnant women, CSR can present with or without retinal exudates and completely resolves in either case. Further studies with a larger sample size are warranted to investigate the risk factors in pregnant women.