Peripapillary Retinoschisis in Glaucoma: A Systematic Review.

Prcis: Peripapillary retinoschisis (PPRS) may bias optical coherence tomography's (OCT) monitoring of glaucoma progression. Its impact on glaucoma still remains uncertain. Only 2 out of the 10 included studies illustrated a correlation between PPRS and glaucoma progression.

Objectives: The frequent use of OCT increased the detection of PPRS, which poses challenges in the follow-up of patients with glaucoma. This systematic review aims to summarize the literature regarding PPRS in glaucoma, exploring its prevalence, impact on disease, and clinical management implications.

Methods: We searched PubMed, Embase, Web of Science, and Scopus with tailored search queries for each platform. All studies had to report PPRS in patients with glaucoma. Exclusion criteria included studies with <10 eyes, studies focusing on schisis outside the disc area, with concomitant retinal or optic nerve lesions, with animals, reviews, studies written in non-English language, and congress abstracts.

Results: Ten studies were included, of which 7 were case-control, one was a cohort study, and 2 were case series.Six studies showed that PPRS often overlapped preexisting retinal nerve fiber layer defects. One study reported that the de novo development of PPRS was more frequent in eyes with glaucoma progression than in eyes without progression.Visual field findings were inconsistent, with just one study (out of 6) showing that patients with glaucoma with PPRS experienced faster visual field deterioration than those without it. Overall, solely 2 studies (out of 7) associated PPRS with faster glaucoma progression.

Conclusions: PPRS biases OCT analysis in glaucoma. Caution is needed against overestimation of retinal nerve fiber layer thickness when PPRS develops and misinterpretation of its resolution as rapid progression. PPRS' exact impact on glaucoma progression remains unclear.