Three-dimensional topographic changes of anterior chamber depth following phacoemulsification with intraocular lens implantation in cataract patients

Purpose To investigate the three-dimensional topographic changes of anterior chamber depth (ACD) following cataract surgery. Methods Seventy-eight eyes with age-related cataract undergoing phacoemulsification and intraocular lens (IOL) implantation were retrospectively enrolled. Participants were evaluated with Pentacam for ACD topography before and approximately four weeks after the surgery. The absolute changes of ACD (AACD) and the relative changes of ACD (RACD) topography were calculated, and three-dimensional topographic contours were plotted. The influence of age, gender, distance to corneal apex (DCA), temporal–nasal and superior–inferior on AACD and RACD was analyzed. Results Both AACD and RACD were negatively correlated with the DCA ( p < 0.001; p < 0.001) and positively correlated with the age at all DCA ( p < 0.05 for all the analyses). Significantly greater AACD and RACD were observed in female subjects ( p < 0.05, respectively, at all DCA). AACD was significantly larger in the temporal compared with the nasal region ( p < 0.001) and at the superior compared with the inferior region ( p < 0.001), but not RACD. Subgroup analysis indicated that the significant difference of the AACD between the temporal and nasal regions was manifested at the DCA of more than 6 mm ( p < 0.001), and the difference between the superior and inferior regions was observed at 2 mm DCA for both AACD ( p < 0.001) and RACD ( p = 0.001). Conclusions We depicted the topographic changes of ACD following cataract surgery and found that it was significantly influenced by age, gender, DCA and quadrant location. The research provided the basis for including postoperative ACD topography prediction before cataract surgery in the future.