CSCR recovering in bad eye, strange, brief symptoms in good eye?

I suffered a very extreme case of CSCR about 7 weeks ago; essentially it built up over about 6 hours, from nothing to a circle covering a large area of the affected eye. An OCT scan was done, showing a large amount of fluid (a MUCH larger area than the OCT on wikipedia), and there was a secondary RPE detachment also.

I improved my diet a lot, started doing *moderate* exercise, and after 7 weeks, returned to clinic for review. The nurse who did the OCT, who is the unit manager, noted it was the worst case (on OCT) she had seen, and also that she couldn't believe the improvement in the affected eye - there was only a tiny amount of fluid left. So essentially I have had a very good improvement over 7 weeks, without treatment apart from changing my diet, eating certain foods etc.

My question is... 10 days ago something strange happened in my GOOD eye. I noticed a small area just off to the right of the fovea, which looked like a small line of (being blinded by a flashbulb). This lasted for about 6 minutes, then suddenly vanished. My repeat OCT was after this, and no abnormalities were shown in the good eye at all. However, I experimented briefly being blinded by the sun... the 'flashbulb' effect lasted only 1 minute max, so can't explain what happened.

Today, in about the same area, in my good eye, I noticed a small area of 'brightness', and assumed it was just glare, so started observing it, expecting it to go away. However, it slowly enlarged over the course of 15 minutes, and had the 'flashbulb;' effect, where you blink and it looks like you have looked at a bright light. It kept getting bigger, but then when I checked about 1 minute later, it had completely gone, and hasn't returned.

My question to any eye doctors out there would be... The symptoms I have had in the good eye almost seem like CSCR is beginning, but then somehow resolves very quickly. Has anyone come across a symptoms like this before, in someone suffering CSCR?. I'm not that worried about the symptom; if it happens in my good eye, then it happens; but it is just strange in that the symptoms are just like the start of CSCR but then go away quite quickly?

Thanks for your help!

[Ray T Oyakawa, MD]

It is probably migraine.  15 minute time course is usually cerebral in origin.

Dr. O.

[j0m]

I hope it is migraine! The things that count against that diagnosis, though, would be that I've never had a migraine, and only had headache maybe 3 times in my life (when I had flu, and once Campylobacter!).

The interesting thing was that the 'flashbulb' thing did grow slowly, just like in my original attack of CSCR, but then went away. The flashbulb had the appearance of the CSR flashbulb, which is different to the flashbulb from the sun (e.g. sun flashbulbs are more extreme when looking at a dark background, whereas the CSR flashbulb area, and the short-lived ones in my good eye, are more extreme when looking at a bright background (eg the sky) and blinking.

I was wondering whether I was suffering temporary ischaemia of the choroid in the good eye; I know that there are RPE changes even in the good eye, in CSR (in fact, diffuse over both eyes). When I first saw the Dr about my bad eye (got the OCT 3 days after it started), he said 'how long did you say you had this again', because it was so extreme, it seemed unlikely it could have only developed over so short a time. I'm not too worried; what will happen will happen, the eye with CSR was 20/10 vision, went down to about 20/40 but is now somthing like 20/15 and getting better each day / week. If I get CSR again anywhere I don't expect it to last long.

I will post here in a few months to update what the outcome was; thanks for your help so far :)

[j0m]

Have developed a peripheral serous detachment in the other eye; this was a very thin wafer-like detachment on OCT. Diagnosis is still CSCR and no other symptoms are present; how often can central serous retinopathy present with peripheral detachments?