Safety and Efficacy of the Visual Field Improvement After Selective Intra-arterial Thrombolysis for Central Retinal Artery Occlusion

Central retinal artery occlusion (CRAO) is an ophthalmic emergency which leads to devastating visual function defects and poor prognosis. Though traditional conservative treatments are widely used, none of them is proved to be effective. The respective responses of brain and retinal tissues to acute ischemia share many features is the rationale for therapeutic thrombolysis in CRAO. Intravenous thrombolysis (IVT) has been a therapeutic choice for CRAO since the 1960s, and in the United States, tPA is currently administered in 5.8% of patients admitted with CRAO. A number of meta-analyses and observational studies indicate intravenous thrombolysis to be beneficial in CRAO. Selective intra-arterial thrombolysis (IAT) introducing rt-PA directly into the ophthalmic circulation by super-selective microcatheterization which has the advantage of reducing the dose of rt-PA reaching the systemic circulation. Thus, IAT may reduce the complications such as intracranial and systemic hemorrhage. The residual visual field is significant for patients with CRAO who have poor central visual acuity. Thus, it is clinically significant to study the changes in visual fields in eyes with CRAO. Sequential evaluation by Humphrey perimetry will evaluate the temporal changes before and after IAT or conservative therapies. Our study will enroll patients within 7 days of symptom onset and aims at evaluating the safety of IAT and comparing the improvement of the VFDs between conservative treatments and IAT combined with conservative treatments.