Sunday, November 4, 2012

My eye abnormalities - part 1

Being an optometry student makes you think about your own eyes a lot. I've received so many practice eye exams this semester that I can't even begin to count them. Because of this, I have learned that I have a few minor but interesting abnormalities about my eyes. Many of these things are genetic, so I'll be examining all of your eyes when I get the chance, just to see if you all have them too.

The first thing that was pointed out to me is that I have something called posterior embryotoxon. This means that some structures surrounding my iris have been pushed forward, resulting in a whitish line around my iris. It looks like this:

http://childrennetwork.org/physicians/ags.html

I only have a few locations of this white line around my eye--it doesn't make a complete circle. And since my eyes are blue it is difficult to see. When you see this white line, you need to do gonioscopy to see if there is something wrong with the inside of your eye. This is gonioscopy:

http://blog.optonotes.com/2008/04/19/atlas-of-gonioscopy/
That thing is a mirror that allows you to see in the periphery. Don't worry--the eye is numb. Anyway, when this was done on me, they saw some peripheral anterior synechiae:

http://dro.hs.columbia.edu/pas.htm
You see that little bump that's pulling the iris over to one side? I have a little one of those. Nothing serious. Once you get the peripheral anterior synechiae, it's called Rieger's Anomaly. It just puts me at a higher risk for developing glaucoma, but the pressure inside my eye is really low, so I'm good.

Now here's the interesting part. I know what you're thinking: how could this get even more interesting? Well, it does. 

This is genetic. It is autosomal dominant, meaning that either Mom or Dad has this, and each kid has a 50% chance of getting it. 

I already know that Alison has this. I know this because corectopia is another sign of Rieger's Anomaly. This is corectopia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corectopia
You see how the pupil is off center? Cool, huh?

Now this is everyone's homework assignment: look in the mirror and see if you see any of these signs, and let me know. It will probably be really hard to tell because it's so subtle. It's so subtle it puts the "B" in subtle.

[Warning: if you do a google image search for any of these things, you'll see some crazy things. For example.





9 comments:

Kathy Haynie said...

Eeewww...no more google searches for me from your blog posts. :)

Love the phrase, "it puts the B in subtle."

David x- said...

My pupils are always super dilated. I don't know if that's a thing, though.

Anna said...

David, that will go away if you stop doing drugs.

Nathan said...

Darn it Anna, I was going to say the EXACT same thing. Ditto, David, what Anna said... Bryan, what if I see floating things that are like, on my eye?

Bryan Lewis said...

Floating things ON your eye? Like, in your tears? If it's in your tears, you need to blink more.

If you have floaters IN your eye, then that's OK, as long you suddenly don't get a lot more one day. That would mean that your retina has detached.

Katie Lewis said...

Anna, don't you feel great about just being a fake, married-in Lewis right now?

Katie Lewis said...

Nathan, please tell us all more about your tears. Haha.

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Unknown said...

Hi, thanks for sharing this. Mu daughter has eyes exactly like yours. Just want to ask if you have other issues aside from the eyes?