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. 2000 Jul;84(7):692–696. doi: 10.1136/bjo.84.7.692

Reassessment of the corneal endothelial cell organisation in children

A Muller 1, M Doughty 1, L Wright 1
PMCID: PMC1723537  PMID: 10873975

Abstract

AIM—To assess uniformity of the corneal endothelial cell mosaic in children.
METHODS—36 healthy children (5-11 years old, 16 boys, 20 girls) were assessed by specular microscopy. Endothelial cell density (ECD) was calculated from measured cell areas, and the number of sides/cell noted.
RESULTS—Average values for ECD and cell areas were 3987 cells/mm2 (95% CI 3806 to 4168 cells/mm2) and 278 (SD 85) µm2 respectively, with normal distribution (COV 28.2%, range 17.4 to 39.2%) and with the average percentage of six sided cells being 66.6% (8.8%). Cell area was positively correlated to number of cell sides (p <0.01, r2=0.993), but the percentage of six sided cells was negatively correlated to ECD (p <0.01, r=0.493).
CONCLUSION—A high ECD occurs in children, but this does not mean there is a high percentage of "hexagons".



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Figure 1  .

Figure 1  

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Typical non-contact specular micrograph of the corneal endothelium of a child. The ECD is 4050 cells/mm2 compared with the group averaged value of 3987 cells/mm2 (see Results).

Figure 2  .

Figure 2  

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Group averaged histogram of endothelial cell areas. The area values were grouped into 0-25, 26-50, etc. and the entire data set pooled (A) or the average values within each group calculated and the mean (SEM) for each interval presented (B). In either case, the overall distribution of areas is clearly Gaussian.

Figure 3  .

Figure 3  

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Tracing overlay of the endothelial mosaic from Figure 1. The six sided cells are so indicated with the overall percentage of six sided cells being 61%, compared with the group averaged value of 66.6% (see Results). Bar = 0.05 mm.

Figure 4  .

Figure 4  

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Area side relations for corneal endothelial cells. The group averaged mean value for the area of each cell type (four, five, six sided, etc) is plotted against the number of cell sides (A) or the mean values from each data set shown in the scatter plot (B). The linear regression shown in (A) is statistically significant (p <0.01; r2 value of 0.993), while the χ2 value across groups in (B) is highly significant at 142 (4 dF, p <0.01).

Figure 5  .

Figure 5  

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Relation between ECD and the percentage of six sided cells in the endothelium. The linear regression is statistically significant (p <0.01; r=0.492).

Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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