ENDOPHTHALMITIS AFTER PARS-PLANA VITRECTOMY

Purpose: To describe the clinical course and incidence of culture-prov en postvitrectomy endophthalmitis in 18 patients from five academic ce nters and three private practices. Methods: Patients undergoing pars p lana vitrectomy for recent trauma or endophthalmitis were excluded, Th e average age was 58 years (range, 21-85 year). Sixty-one percent of t he patients (11/18) had diabetes mellitus. The indication for initial vitrectomy was vitreous hemorrhage (n = 10), macular epiretinal membra ne (n = 3), recurrent retinal detachment with proliferative vitreoreti nopathy (n = 2), retinal detachment with retinoschisis (n = 1), prolif erative diabetic retinopathy with tractional retinal detachment (n = 1 ), and dislocated intraocular lens (n = 1), None of these eyes receive d prophylactic intraocular antibiotics during the vitrectomy. Results: All eyes were treated with intraocular antibiotics after the diagnosi s of postvitrectomy endophthalmitis was made. Final visual acuity rang ed from 20/20 to no light perception and included five eyes with 20/50 or better visual acuity and 11 eyes with less than 5/200 visual acuit y. Nine eyes had a final visual acuity of no light perception. Of the 16 eyes infected with a single organism, 71% (5/7) of eyes infected wi th coagulase-negative staphylococci retained 20/50 or better final vis ual acuity compared with no eyes (0/9) infected with other organisms ( P = 0.005). Two eyes infected with both coagulase-negative Staphylococ cus and Streptococcus had a final visual acuity of 20/400. Three eyes with a total hypopyon later had enucleation or evisceration. Based on the data from four medical centers, the incidence of endophthalmitis a fter pars plana vitrectomy performed over the last 10 years was 9/12,2 16 (0.07%). Conclusion: Endophthalmitis after vitrectomy is rare. Post vitrectomy bacterial endophthalmitis caused by organisms other than co agulase-negative staphylococci has a poor visual prognosis.