Retinal breaks in diabetic retinopathy: vitreoretinal relationships.

We retrospectively reviewed the eyes of 143 patients with tractional retinal detachment caused by diabetes that had been studied biomicroscopically, and, after some exclusions, divided them into two groups: those with retinal breaks (group 1) (16 patients, 16 eyes), and those without retinal breaks (group 2) (127 patients, 161 eyes). The group 1 eyes were further divided into three subgroups: those with retinal tears from limited anteroposterior vitreous traction (subgroup A), those with macular holes in an area without posterior vitreous detachment (subgroup B), and those with oval retinal holes anterior to the anteroposterior vitreous traction (subgroup C). Subgroup C comprised most of the eyes in group 1 (10 eyes) and was the only subgroup that we compared with group 2. Significant differences between subgroup C and group 2 were found in terms of the extent of tractional retinal detachment (P = .002) and the degree of preretinal fibrosis (P = .009). These data suggest that large tractional retinal detachments and extensive preretinal fibrosis are significant risk factors for the development of retinal breaks in proliferative diabetic retinopathy.