Early vitrectomy for dense vitreous hemorrhage in adults with non-traumatic and non-diabetic retinopathy

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the etiologies for dense vitreous hemorrhage in adults with non-traumatic and reveal management of early vitrectomy for the disease. METHODS: Study included 105 eyes from 105 patients. Outcome measures were etiologies of vitreous hemorrhage, formation of retinal and/or disk neovascular membrane (NVM), incidence of retinal tear and detachment, visual acuity (VA) and postoperative complications. RESULTS: Mean time between presentation and surgery was 7.1 days. The most common etiologies were retinal vein occlusion (RVO) (58.1%), retinal tear (22.9%) and retinal vasculitis (10.4%). Most RVO (77.0%) and retinal vasculitis (72.7%) eyes were associated with retinal and/or disk NVM. Retinal tear and retinal detachment was found in 24 and 48 eyes, respectively. VA improved significantly from 1/70 to 0.6 following vitrectomy. The most common postoperative complication was cataract (28.6%). CONCLUSION: RVO, retinal tear and retinal vasculitis were the most common causes of dense vitreous hemorrhage. Early vitrectomy has a good outcome with acceptable complication rates in this setting.