To determine the relationship between subfoveal choroidal thickness of fellow eyes and choroidal vascular hyperpermeability in unilateral central serous chorioretinopathy (CSC).

Thirty patients with unilateral CSC and 28 normal subjects underwent enhanced depth imaging spectral-domain optical coherence tomography to evaluate bilateral subfoveal choroidal thickness. The subfoveal choroidal thickness was measured from the outer RPE border to the inner sclera border. Choroidal vascular hyperpermeability was visualized with indocyanine green angiography (ICGA) and analyzed.

The mean subfoveal choroidal thickness in the affected eyes (439.6 ± 136.5 µm) was significantly thicker than that in fellow eyes (340.0 ± 103.3 µm, p = 0.002), and both showed statistically significant difference compared with normal subjects (266.5 ± 111.5 µm, p < 0.001, p = 0.019). The subfoveal choroidal thickness of fellow eyes with choroidal vascular hyperpermeability was 370.0 ± 176.5 µm, which differed significantly ( p = 0.037) from the choroid without choroidal vascular hyperpermeability. The choroidal thickness of acute CSC was 441.6 ± 118.6 µm, and that of chronic CSC was 454 ± 166.5 µm, a difference that was not statistically significant ( p = 0.676).

The subfoveal choroid with hyperpermeability was thicker than that without hyperpermeability on ICGA in the fellow eyes of patients with unilateral CSC. Enhanced depth imaging spectral-domain optical coherence tomography can indirectly evaluate the effects of choroidal hyperpermeability by noninvasively measuring the choroidal thickness.