Abstract
PURPOSE: To analyse retinal and choroidal microvasculature features in healthy pregnant women using optical coherence tomography angiography (OCTA). METHODS: PubMed, Embase, Ovid, Web of Science and Cochrane Library were searched for published studies that compare retinal and choroidal microvasculature characteristics between pregnant females and non-pregnant females from inception to November 2023. The statistics were continuous variables. They were presented as the mean difference (MD) with a corresponding 95% CI. We used Review Manager software 5.4.1 for statistical analysis. RESULTS: A total of 5 eligible studies involving 219 eyes in the pregnancy group and 186 eyes in the control group were included in the meta-analysis. The pooled results showed that the retinal deep capillary plexus vascular density (DCP VD) measured by OCTA was significantly higher in healthy pregnant women than in controls (MD 1.53; 95% CI 0.62 to 2.44; I(2)=0%; p=0.0009). However, differences between the two groups in the retinal superficial capillary plexus VD (SCP VD) (MD 0.41;95% CI -1.26 to 2.09; I(2)=85%; p=0.63), the foveal avascular zone (FAZ) (MD 0.01; 95% CI -0.01 to 0.03; I(2)=14%; p=0.18), the choriocapillaris VD (CC VD) (MD 0.76; 95% CI -1.11 to 2.64; I(2)=79%; p=0.43) were uncertain. CONCLUSIONS: Our meta-analysis found that the DCP VD of healthy pregnant women was higher than that of non-pregnant controls. However, differences in SCP VD, FAZ and CC VD between the healthy pregnant women and the non-pregnancy controls were uncertain. Our findings can help to get a deeper understanding of retinal and choroidal microvascular characteristics during pregnancy.