Assessment of the spontaneous pulsations of the central retinal vein in daily ophthalmic practice.

The purpose of this study is to assess the frequency of eyes with a spontaneous pulsation of the central retinal vein in the setting of a busy daily ophthalmic practice. The clinical observational case-series study included 690 eyes (345 subjects). The optic disc was ophthalmoscopically assessed using a non-contact ophthalmoscopic lens at the slit lamp. Out of the study population, 526 eyes (76.2%) of 265 (76.8%) subjects showed a detected spontaneous pulsation of the central retinal vein (prevalence rate: 76.2 +/- 1.6% [mean +/- standard error] per eye, and 76.8 +/- 2.3% per subject). In univariate analysis, the presence of a detected spontaneous central retinal vein pulsations was statistically associated with systolic systemic blood pressure (P = 0.04) and with the ocular perfusion pressure (P = 0.03). The results suggest that as examined in the setting of a busy daily ophthalmic practice, the central retinal vein was found to show a spontaneous pulsation in about 80% of the subjects.