Acute effects of exercise on choroidal thickness and ocular pulse amplitude

Abstract

Aim: To explore ocular changes in healthy people after exercise. Material and Method: Twenty participants underwent exercise for 15 minutes on a treadmill. Measurements of choroidal thickness, intraocular pressure (IOP), ocular pulse amplitude (OPA), and blood pressure were taken before and after exercise. Enhanced Depth, Imaging optical coherence tomography (EDI-OCT) was used to measure choroidal thickness at the fovea and at the areas 1500 mu m nasal and 1500 mu m temporal to the fovea; IOP and OPA were measured by the dynamic contour tonometer (DCT; Swiss Micro technology AG, Port, Switzerland). Blood pressure was measured concurrently with the acquisition of the scans. Results: Twenty participants (20 eyes) with a mean age of 22.65 +/- 0.98 years were measured. There was a significant increase in systolic and diastolic pressure after exercise (p<0.05). There was a significant decrease in IOP and OPA after exercise (p<0.05). There was no significant difference in the subfoveal, nasal or temporal choroidal thickness measurements after exercise (p>0.05). Discussion: In our study, there was no significant change in the thickness of the choroid after exercise. IOP and OPA significantly decreased, and systolic and diastolic blood pressure significantly increased, after exercise. This indicates an adaptation of vascular resistance due to vasoconstriction. The IOP and OPA decreases do not seem to be related with the changes in choroid thickness.