MITA: Keeping Workers Productive - Medical Imaging Helps Employers Defeat Diabetic Eye Disease

Medical Imaging Helps Employers Defeat Diabetic Eye Disease

Diabetic retinopathy is the primary cause of blindness among working age people. It involves narrowing of the blood vessels in the retina and is a common complication of diabetes. The National Institutes of Health report that between 600,000 and 700,000 Americans have diabetic retinopathy that is serious enough to result in vision loss. It causes 24,000 people to go blind every year.¹

Diabetic retinopathy is a serious issue for business: It strikes working-age people, particularly those from 45 to 64 years of age, driving up both health and disability costs. A 2001 study in Diabetes Care reported that complications from diabetes – including retinopathy and optical damage – translated into 3.2 days of missed work within a 2-week period.² Avoiding such complications, according to the study, would significantly increase worker productivity.
Diabetic eye diseases, including retinopathy, consume 25 percent of all U.S. health care services related to eye disease.³ Much of that falls on employers.

Medical imaging is contributing to early detection of diabetic retinopathy.⁴ That's important because early detection can lead to prevention and cure.

One example is a new imaging technology called optical coherence tomography. The device directs a pair of near-infrared beams that provide a series of radial scans around the circumference of the eye, giving physicians a sense of the thickness of the retina.⁵
This technology can provide objective measures that other testing modes cannot provide, thereby aiding understanding and planning for physician action.
An advanced version of the device provides as much detail of the retinal layer as a surgical operation would provide⁶.
Studies are now underway on other imaging technologies for use in detection of diabetic retinopathy, including the use of functional MRI.

¹ "Facts About Diabetic Eye Disease," National Eye Health Education Program, National Eye Institute, at http://www.medhelp.org/NIHlib/GF-20.html, accessed January 31, 2004.
² "Productivity Losses Associated with Diabetes in the U.S.," Ng YC, Jacobs P, Johnson JA, Diabetes Care, 24:257-261, 2001.
³ "Economic Costs of Diabetes in the US in 2002," the American Diabetes Association, Diabetes Care, 26:917-932, 2003.
⁴ "Enhanced Visualization of Macular Pathology with the Use of Ultrahigh-Resolution Optical Coherence Tomography," Drexler W, Saltman H, Hermann B, Ko TH, Stur M, Unterhuber A, Scholda C, Findl O, Wirtitsch M, Fujimoto JG, Fercher AF, Archives of Ophthalmology, 121:695-706, 2003.
⁵ "Diabetic Retinopathy," Frank R, New England Journal of Medicine, 350; 1, January 1, 2004. Also "Retinal Thickness Study with Optical Coherence Tomography in Patients with Diabetes," Sanchez-Tocino H, Alvarez-Vidal A, Maldanado MJ, Moreno-Montanes J, Garcia-Layana A, Investigative Ophthalmology & Visual Science, Vol. 43, No. 5, May 2002.
⁶ Ibid.