In this issue of IOVS, Davidson and colleagues1 apply a range of conventional techniques and the novel ophthalmic technique of corneal confocal microscopy (CCM) to phenotype nerve damage in an experimental model of prediabetes and type 2 diabetes. The key findings are that CCM allows a noninvasive demonstration of an early reduction in corneal innervation that correlates with a reduction in both corneal and intraepidermal nerve fiber density derived using invasive corneal and skin biopsy and conventional tissue histology. These abnormalities occur in parallel with a reduction in corneal sensitivity and conventionally accepted end points of thermal nociception latency and sensory nerve conduction velocity. These data build on the concept that CCM allows the rapid, noninvasive, and hence reiterative study of corneal nerves in a variety of animal species,2 and in particular in the diagnosis and assessment of therapeutic efficacy in experimental diabetes3,4 and patients with diabetic neuropathy.5,6
展开▼
