Clinical and Genetic Features of Familial Exudative Vitreoretinopathy With Only-Unilateral Abnormalities in a Chinese Cohort.

IMPORTANCE

Familial exudative vitreoretinopathy (FEVR) with only-unilateral abnormalities may masquerade as other vitreoretinal disorders. Clinicians should be vigilant of patients with unilateral FEVR, recognizing that the relatively normal vision of the fellow eye could compromise a patient's attention to the decreasing vision of the affected eye.

OBJECTIVE

To describe the clinical findings and genetic spectrum of patients with FEVR and only-unilateral abnormalities.

DESIGN, SETTING, AND

PARTICIPANTS

A medical records review included all patients (N = 621) with a diagnosis of FEVR between January 1, 2010, and October 31, 2017, from Xinhua Hospital in Shanghai, China. Patients were excluded if retinal abnormalities were noted in both eyes or if a diagnosis of FEVR could not be confirmed by genetic testing. Inclusion criteria included clinical diagnosis of FEVR with only-unilateral features on widefield angiography and confirmed mutations in 5 FEVR targeted genes (LRP5, FZD4, ZNF408, NDP, and TSPAN12).

EXPOSURES: Clinical data were collected from patient medical records. Widefield angiography and targeted gene sequencing were performed in all patients of this cohort.

MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: Clinical findings and genetic spectrum.

RESULTS

Of the 621 patients with a clinical diagnosis of FEVR, 20 with unilateral FEVR (3.22%; 95% CI, 1.83%-4.61%; 18 males [90%] and a mean [SD] age at presentation of 2.6 [2.7] years) were identified. All patients were Han Chinese. The most common clinical presentations were total retinal detachment (12 [60%]) and retinal fold (6 [30%]). Mutations in the LRP5 gene were the most prevalent (11 [55%]), followed by the genes FZD4 (4 [20%]), ZNF408 (2 [10%]), TSPAN12 (2 [10%]), and NDP (1 [5%]).

CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: The findings of this study suggest that the identification of unilateral peripheral retinal abnormalities should include a consideration of FEVR, perhaps more often seen with mutations in the LRP5 gene; variable phenotypic penetrance of the retinal abnormalities can lead to seemingly unilateral disease.