Screening for diabetic retinopathy with ophthalmoscopy: the contribution of non ophthalmologist praticians seems to be possible

Diabetic retinopathy is a severe and frequent complication of diabetes. Scr eening and early treatment of retinal lesions avoid blindness, but diagnosi s is often established too late. The purpose of our study was to compare th e concordance between the results of examination of fundus oculi whether pe rformed by a previously trained non ophthalmologist physician at diabetes d ay center or during a routine ophthalmology consultation. Results were clas sified a posteriori in order to have binary response (presence of the lesio n, absence of the lesion). Ninety six eyes were examined. Results of these examinations were compared using the kappa test agreement (kappa). The concordance was good for the ma jority of retinal lesions. The concordance in the results suggests that the contribution of non ophtha lmologist physicians to the screening of diabetic retinopathy is possible a nd could facilitate the selection of patients who require specialized and e laborate ophthalmologic exploration.