A Case of Unilateral Purtscher Like Retinopathy After Spinal Surgery

Otmar Purtscher evaluating a head trauma patient in 1910.1 The ethology is not known clearly but believed to be associated with occlusion of the arterioles that supplies the peripapillary capillaries.2 Although the first case described in literature was a trauma case, Purtscher like retinopathy has been defined in different conditions such as acute pancreatitis, childbirth, chronic renal failure, barotrauma, steroid injections in and around the orbit and nasal passages, retrobulbar anesthesia, retinal vasculitis associated with autoantibodies, preeclampsia, lupus and other non-trauma related cases.2-4 The diagnostic clinical findings of Purtscher retinopathy is seen bilaterally in 60% of cases.3 They are localized to the peripapillary area and posterior pole of the retina. It is a clinical diagnosis with opthalmoscopic Turkiye Klinikleri J Ophthalmol 2018;27(1):65-7