gms | German Medical Science

Recent development of ultrabroad bandwidth light sources has recently enabled significant im­prove­ment of ophthalmic axial OCT imaging resolution, demonstrating the potential of ultrahigh resolution OCT (UHR OCT) to perform non-invasive optical biopsy, i.e. the in vivo visu­alization of microstructural mor­phology in situ, which had pre­viously only been pos­sible with histo­pathology. Therefore UHR OCT allows detection of intraretinal changes that can be used for diag­nosis of retinal disease in its early stages, when treat­ment is most effective and irreversible dam­age can be pre­vented or delayed. Furthermore it may provide a better un­derstanding of the pathogenesis of several macular pathologies as well as the development of new therapy approaches. Future developments of ophthalmic OCT in­clude high speed, three dimensional retinal imaging, combining adaptive optics and UHR OCT, spatially resolved spec­troscopic OCT, functional imaging as well as OCT imaging with enhanced penetration into the choroid by employing novel wavelength regions.