Characterizing drusen using modern multimodal imaging of the retina

Aim
To present and analyze various types of drusen using the modern multimodal imaging techniques in patients with diagnosed age-related macular degeneration.

Material and methods
62 patients (41 women and 21 men) aged 42–75 years (mean age: 59.7 years) with various types of drusen were retrospectively analysed. Only patients with the predominant one type drusen in the fundus were enrolled. Patients with mixed drusen were excluded. In all cases, the basic eye examination was performed with color fundus photography, infrared fundus photography, fundus autofluorescence, swept-source optical coherence photography and fluorescein angiography.

Results
A detailed analysis of multimodal imaging scans demonstrated that the most common types of drusen were soft drusen (41.9%) and hard drusen (22.6%). Calcified drusen and pseudodrusen were only detected in 4.8% and 6.5% of patients, respectively.

Conclusion
Using the newest retinal imaging techniques and analyzing their results allows for the differentiation of drusen and assessing the dynamics of their progression, which is important in monitoring patients at high risk of age-related macular degeneration.