Patients
In this observational and prospective study, 18 Italian children (mean age 8.78 ± 5.87 years) with a neuroradiologically proven “molar tooth sign” were selected (see inclusion criteria below) from a larger cohort of JS patients recruited within the frame of a larger clinical-genetic project on cerebellar and brainstem congenital defects (CBCD).
Seventeen healthy age- and gender-matched (mean age 9.05 ± 6.02 years) control subjects were also enrolled. JS patients and healthy controls were enrolled at the Department of Child Neurology and Child Psychiatry IRCCS C. Mondino, Pavia, and submitted to complete ophthalmologic evaluation (see below) at the Section of Ophthalmology, University of Pavia, IRCCS Fondazione Policlinico San Matteo, Pavia. All subjects underwent a complete diagnostic work-up including a detailed assessment of kidney, liver and heart function.
All patients receiving a neuroradiologic diagnosis of JS underwent an NGS-based molecular analysis of a large panel of ciliary genes, including known JS-related genes [5, 6] and genes responsible for other primary ciliopathies (e.g., skeletal ciliopathies, renal ciliopathies, Bardet-Biedl syndrome, Meckel syndrome, etc.) as well as candidate genes that emerged from whole-exome sequencing studies. Identified pathogenic variants were confirmed by Sanger sequencing, and segregation with the disease in the family was assessed by sequencing family members, when available. Genes responsible for LHON or other non-ciliopathy retinal dystrophies were not included in the panel, as this was mainly aimed at testing patients with Joubert syndrome and other primary ciliopathies.
JS patients and controls had a complete ophthalmologic examination including best corrected visual acuity (BCVA) assessments. Anterior segment evaluation with a slit lamp was performed depending on the patients’ cooperation. Cycloplegic refraction (cyclopentolate 1%) and dilated fundus examination with indirect ophthalmoscopy were performed for each patient.
Since VEP recordings were performed by using a binocular stimulation (see below, VEP assessment), patients were divided in two groups based on the presence (JS-A, n = 8) or absence (JS-N, n = 10) of binocular characteristics of the optic nerve morphologic involvement (i.e., coloboma, pale optic disc head, optic disc head cupping). Since a retinal dysfunctional condition may influence VEP responses [26, 27], the main inclusion criterion was the absence of retinal dystrophies at fundus examination. For JS patients and controls, exclusion criteria were optic media opacities, previous history of optic neuropathy or glaucoma, refractive error < ± 3 equivalent spherical diopters, and concomitant general (i.e., diabetes) or neurologic diseases.
Demographic and genetic data, visual acuity and type of morphologic optic nerve involvement in the control, JS-A and JS-N groups are reported in Table 1.
Table 1 (A) Demographic, identified genetic variant, visual acuity and (B) type of morphologic optic nerve involvement (with relative identified genetic variant) observed in control subjects and in patients with Joubert syndrome with (JS-A group) or without (JS-N group) optic nerve morphologic abnormalities The research followed the tenets of the Declaration of Helsinki, and the study was approved by local Institutional Review Board (Scientific Committee of Section of Ophthalmology, University of Pavia, IRCCS Fondazione Policlinico San Matteo, Pavia, Italy). Informed consent was obtained from the parents of each child.
Visual Acuity Evaluation
In verbal children, BCVA was assessed by the modified Early Treatment Diabetic Retinopathy Study (ETDRS) Charts (Lighthouse, Low Vision Products, Long Island City, NY, USA) and expressed in logMAR values obtained at the distance of 4, 2, 1 and 0.5 m. In preverbal and nonverbal children, BCVA was measured with Teller acuity cards (TACs), and the values were converted to logMAR.
VEP Assessment
VEP recordings were performed according to ISCEV standard [21] protocols.
Briefly, subjects were seated and adapted to room light in a semi-dark, acoustically isolated room for 10 min in front of the display and surrounded by a uniform field of luminance of five candelas per m2. Pupil diameter was approximately 5 mm. No mydriatic or miotic drugs were used. Visual stimuli were checkerboard patterns (contrast, 80%; mean luminance, 110 cd/m2) generated on a TV monitor and reversed in contrast at the rate of two reversals per second. At the viewing distance of 114 cm, the check edges subtended 60 min (60’) and 15 min (15’) of the visual angle. As suggested by the ISCEV standards, VEPs were recorded in response to 60’ (60’ VEP) and 15’ (15’ VEP) checks to obtain a prevalent activation of large (with 60’ checks) or small (with 15’ checks) axons [22, 25]. The monitor screen subtended 23°. A small fixation target, subtending a visual angle of approximately 0.5° (estimated after considering spectacle-corrected individual refractive errors), was placed at the center of the pattern stimulus. For every VEP acquisition, each patient positively reported that he/she could clearly perceive the fixation target.
In JS patients and controls, VEPs were recorded by using a binocular stimulation. About this, the ISCEV standards recommend a monocular stimulation for separating the bioelectrical signals of each eye, but it also reports the following: “Monocular stimulation is standard. This may not be practical in infants or other special populations; in such cases binocular stimulation may be used to assess visual pathway function from both eyes” [21]. Since our JS patients can be considered a “special population,” we believe that the binocular stimulation was appropriate with respect to the aim of the study. The monocular stimulation is preferred in patients with different optic nerve conditions between the eyes (i.e., absence of nerve abnormalities in the right eye and coloboma in left eye); in fact, in this case, if a binocular stimulation is performed, the VEP responses are highly related to the normal eye with a negligible contribution of the abnormal eye. To contrast this source of bias, we enrolled selected JS patients based on the presence of the same optic nerve morphologic abnormalities in both eyes or with binocular absence of optic nerve morphologic abnormalities (see inclusion criteria and Table 1).The transient VEP response is characterized by several waves with three subsequent peaks of negative, positive and negative polarity, respectively. In visually normal subjects, these peaks have the following implicit times: 75, 100 and 145 ms (N75, P100 and N145). VEP P100 implicit time (IT) and N75-P100 peak-to-peak amplitude (A) were measured, in milliseconds (ms) and microvolts (µV), respectively, directly on the displayed records by means of a pair of cursors (see Fig. 1).
During a recording session, VEPs were recorded at least twice (between 2 to 5 times), and the resulting waveforms were superimposed to check the consistency of results. Based on previous studies [24, 25], we know that intra-individual variability (evaluated by test-retest) is approximately ± 2 ms for VEP P100 IT and approximately ± 0.18 µV for VEP N75-P100 A. During the recording session we considered two successive waveforms “superimposable,” and therefore repeatable, with a difference in ms (for VEP P100 IT) and in µV (for VEP N75-P100 A) less than the above-reported values of intra-individual variability. At times, the first two recordings were sufficient to obtain repeatable waveforms, while other times, further recordings were required (albeit never more than 5 in the cohort of JS patients). For statistical analyses (see below), we considered the VEP P00 IT and N75-P100 A values measured in the recording with the shorter VEP P100 IT.
Statistical Analysis
The Anderson-Darling and Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests were applied to verify that data were normally distributed.
Differences in values of BCVA and VEP parameters (P100 IT and N75-P100 A) between the control and JS groups were evaluated by the one-way analysis of variance (ANOVA). Pearson’s test was used to assess the relationship between the values of BCVA and those of VEP parameters. All statistical analyses were performed using SPSS V.26 (Statistical Package for Social Science IBM), and p < 0.01 was considered as statistically significant.