Credit: Mount Sinai Health System
Images shows the damaged retina of a study participant who had a previous heart attack. The abnormal subretinal drusenoid deposits (SDDs) are the multiple, gray, conical lesions (yellow arrows) sitting on top of the bright white band known as the retinal pigment epithelium (RPE). They are pushing and penetrating the thin white retinal layer above them. All the other retinal layers further above are normal. The eye’s blood supply, seen below the RPE and known as the choroid, is abnormally thin because the weakened heart is not pumping enough blood to the eye.