Lasers in Surgery and Medicine 40:20–27 (2008) Investigation of Selective Retina Treatment (SRT) by Means of 8 ns Laser Pulses in a Rabbit Model

Background: It has been shown that selective retina treatment (SRT) using a train of 1.7 microseconds laser pulses allows selective damage of the retinal pigment epithelium (RPE) while sparing the adjacent photorecep-tors and thus avoiding laser scotoma. It was the purpose of this work to investigate SRT laser effects with Q-switched pulses of only 8 nanoseconds in duration by evaluating the angiographic and ophthalmoscopic damage thresholds and the damage range by histology in a rabbit model. Materials andMethods:A flash lamp pumped frequency doubled (532 nm) Nd:YAG laser with 8 nanoseconds pulse duration was used. In total 210 laser lesions, each cal-culated to be 102 mm in diameter on retina, were applied through a slit lamp onto the fundus of six eyes of Chinchilla Bastard rabbits. The rabbits were irradiated with increas