RESUMO
We performed prospective study of corneal endothelial damage associated with expanding gas during pars plana vitrectomy in 33 patients. A total of 16 eyes were performed vitrectomy with lens removal(intact anterior capsule), only 6 eyes in the gas treated group and 10 eyes in the control group. Among 19 eyes underwent vitrectomy without lens removal, 10 eyes treated with the expanding gas, which was not performed in the other 9 patients. The corneal endothelium was examined with a noncontact specular microscopy preoperatively and 3 months postoperatively. Endothelial changes were analyzed by comuterized morphometric data of individual cells and represented cell density, coefficient of variation, and hexaponality. The mean endothelial cell loss was 2.73% in 9 phakic eyes which underwent vitrectomy without expanding gas and 5.99% in 10 phakic eyes which underwent vitrectomy with expanding gas. In aphakic eyes, vitrectomy was comvined with lensectomy and expanding gas, the mean endothelial cell loss was 6.81%. The changes of endothelial cell density and hexagonality were not statistically significant. But coefficient of variation in aphakic eyes with vitrectomy using expanding gas was higher compared with other groups. As our results, although the difference of coefficient of expanding gas during vitrectomy in aphakic eyes seems to be safe. Because during vitrectomy with expanding gas in aphakic eyes.