INTRODUCTION:
Worldwide, the incidence of type II diabetes mellitus is increasing, reaching epidemic proportions in developing countries. The disease entity is characterized by hyperglycemia and the development of micro- and macrovascular disorders, leading to functional and morphological disorders in several organs. Diabetes mellitus is associated also with structural changes in corneal endothelial cells and their thickness. Many clinical evidences have shown that patients with diabetes have functional abnormalities such as lower corneal sensitivity, greater baseline corneal thickness, less endothelial cell density, and increased endothelial permeability to fluorescein after intraocular surgery. Hypothetically, these phenomena could be caused by chronic metabolic changes at cellular level that primarily affect the single layer of the coherent endothelial cells. Thus, we performed our study to evaluate the differences of central corneal thickness and corneal endothelial cell morphology between diabetics and age matched healthy normal subjects.

AIM OF THE WORK:
The aim of this work was to evaluate the corneal endothelial changes in patients with type 2 Diabetes mellitus.