1
|
Škunca Herman J, Marić G, Ravlić MM, Knežević L, Jerković I, Sušić E, Marić V, Vicković IP, Vatavuk Z, Polašek O. Diplopia, COVID-19 and Vaccination: Results from a Cross-Sectional Study in Croatia. Vaccines (Basel) 2022; 10:vaccines10091558. [PMID: 36146636 PMCID: PMC9503164 DOI: 10.3390/vaccines10091558] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/02/2022] [Revised: 08/30/2022] [Accepted: 09/16/2022] [Indexed: 11/16/2022] Open
Abstract
The aim of this study was to explore diplopia as a symptom of undetected COVID-19 infection or as a possible side effect of COVID-19 vaccination. We examined 380 patients with diplopia admitted to the Department of Ophthalmology of the University Hospital Centre Sestre milosrdnice in Zagreb, Croatia, from July 2020 to June 2022. After excluding patients with confirmed organic underlying diplopia causes or monocular diplopia, we linked the patient information with the national COVID-19 and vaccination registries. Among the 91 patients included in this study, previously undetected COVID-19 infection as the possible cause of diplopia was confirmed in five of them (5.5%). An additional nine patients (9.9%) were vaccinated within one month from the onset of their symptoms, while the remaining 77 had neither and were therefore considered as controls. The breakdown according to the mechanism of diplopia showed no substantial difference between the vaccinated patients and the controls. We detected marginally insignificant excess abducens nerve affection in the COVID-positive group compared with that in the controls (p = 0.051). Post-vaccination diplopia was equally common in patients who received vector-based or RNA-based vaccines (21.4 vs. 16.7%; p = 0.694). COVID-19 testing should be performed for all cases of otherwise unexplained diplopia. The risk of post-vaccination diplopia was similar in both types of vaccines administered, suggesting a lack of evidence linking specific vaccine types to diplopia.
Collapse
Affiliation(s)
- Jelena Škunca Herman
- Department of Ophthalmology, University Hospital Centre Sestre Milosrdnice, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
| | - Goran Marić
- Department of Ophthalmology, University Hospital Centre Sestre Milosrdnice, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
| | - Maja Malenica Ravlić
- Department of Ophthalmology, University Hospital Centre Sestre Milosrdnice, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
| | - Lana Knežević
- Department of Ophthalmology, University Hospital Centre Sestre Milosrdnice, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
| | - Ivan Jerković
- Department of Ophthalmology, University Hospital Centre Sestre Milosrdnice, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
| | - Ena Sušić
- Department of Ophthalmology, University Hospital Centre Sestre Milosrdnice, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
| | - Vedrana Marić
- Croatian Institute of Public Health, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
| | - Ivanka Petric Vicković
- Department of Ophthalmology, University Hospital Centre Sestre Milosrdnice, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
| | - Zoran Vatavuk
- Department of Ophthalmology, University Hospital Centre Sestre Milosrdnice, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
| | - Ozren Polašek
- Department of Public Health, University of Split School of Medicine, 21000 Split, Croatia
- Algebra LAB, Algebra University College, 10000 Zagreb, Croatia
- Correspondence:
| |
Collapse
|