Peripheral Avascular Retina in Retinopathy of Prematurity

Retinopathy of prematurity (ROP) is a widely known retinal vascular disorder in preterm infants and a leading cause of visual disability or blindness in children. Advances in antenatal care have resulted in an increase in the survival rate of infants with extremely low birth weight (BW). Approximately 90% of infants who develop ROP do so by a postmenstrual age of 46.3 weeks. In certain patients with or without treatment, the retina may fail to fully vascularize or may develop vascular abnormalities, thus demonstrating persistent avascular retina (PAR) or anomalous vessel findings at the periphery. Because of the advent of technologies such as ultrawide-field fluorescein angiography (UWFFA) persistent vascular abnormalities can be detected more readily and investigated.