Yeungnam Univ J Med.  2007 Dec;24(2):329-332.

A Case of Chronic Monocular Solar Retinopathy

• Chang W

Abstract

Solar retinopathy is a rare but well-recognized clinical entity of macular damage, caused by viewing a solar eclipse or direct sun gazing. A 21-year-old man gazed at the sun for approximately thirty seconds at noon using a monocular telescope with his left eye. Forty-eight hours after sun gazing, the patient experienced symptoms of blurred vision and central scotoma in the left eye. Eight months after sun gazing, the visual acuity decreased from 1.0 to 0.1 in the left eye and the fundus examination showed a round, yellowish-white discoid lesion at the left fovea. Fluorescein angiography showed an early window defect in the fovea of the left eye, that persisted without size change during the late phase resulting from atrophy of the retinal pigment epithelium. A small, central scotoma of the left eye was also found in the visual field test. The visual acuity was unchanged at the end of a one-year follow-up period.

Keyword

Scotoma; Solar retinopathy; Sun-gaze

MeSH Terms

Atrophy
Fluorescein Angiography
Follow-Up Studies
Humans
Retinal Pigment Epithelium
Scotoma
Solar System
Telescopes
Visual Acuity
Visual Field Tests
Young Adult