Neuro-ophthalmology

What is neuro-ophthalmology?
After light is focused by the cornea and lens, and lands on the retina, the optic nerve transfers the information to the brain, which sends signals to muscles that control eye movement and pupil size. Neuro-ophthalmology focuses on those nerves and the brain.

It deals with diseases of the brain and central nervous system with manifestations in the eyes, such as optic neuropathies (damage to the optic nerve), eye movement abnormalities, orbital diseases and trauma, and other neurologic disorders affecting the visual system, such as Graves' ophthalmopathy (thyroid disease effects on the eye), optic neuritis (inflammation of the optic nerve), esotropia ("cross-eyed"), benign and malignant orbital tumors and nerve palsy (non-functioning nerve causing paralysis). In addition, such conditions as brain tumors, neuro-degenerative processes, strokes, demyelinating disease (damage to the "wrapping" around nerve cells), and muscle weakness conditions (myasthenia gravis - damage to the nerve-muscle junction) can have ocular symptoms.

Symptoms:
The underlying disease behind such symptoms as unexplained loss of visual acuity, peripheral (side) vision, pupillary abnormalities, double vision, numbness of the face, and twitching of facial and eyelid muscles might be covered by a neuro-ophthalmologist.

Doctors

• Madhu R. Agarwal, MD