Flashing Lights

I am a 42 year old woman, always very myopic, had some recent problems (last year) with dry eye but seems resolved now.  Today I got out of the car and suddenly there were flashing lights in my eyes - not bursts of white light, quickly flashing black and white in a semi-circle shape to the left of the vision in both eyes...very distracting and distorting the vision a bit in that direction.  This last for about 15 minutes.

Generally I'm healthy - however am currently going through tests for arthritis symptoms.

Should I be worried or get checked out?

[Nancy T]

Sounds like it's probably ocular migraine (also known as ophthalmic migraine or visual migraine). Lasting 15 minutes is a gigantic clue!

I was also 42 when I got my first ocular migraine--panicked, thought I was having a stroke (my vision got a "blank" spot followed by flashing block-letter C that spread up and out over 30 minutes).

Migraine activity can often start up at perimenopause, which was the case with me. They can be unlike your previous migraines. (I never knew I was a migraineur until I got the ocular ones.) I only got three ocular migraines over a few months in 1999-2000, then never again.

NOTE: You do NOT, absolutely NOT have to have a headache to have a migraine.

Best to see your regular doctor and an eye doctor (ophthalmologist, that is, an eye MD) anyway.

Nancy T.

[John C Hagan III, MD, FACS, FAAO]

Nancy T is right. Use the search feature an look up TIA and Ophthalmic Migraine. See an Eye MD find one at www.aao.org  This can be due to serious disease of the eye, brain, heart, blood vessels.

JCH MD

[rnpurdy]

I'm a white male 45 years old and the "C" shaped flashing lights in the eyes happend to me today (lasted for 20min.).  I'm a CAD drafter and stare at a computer all day.  I thought I was having a stroke.

Neil P.

[Harold14370]

I had flashing lights like that right before I got a torn retina, except it was only in one eye. If you all of a sudden see a lot of huge floaters, it's an emergency and you will have to see the eye doctor right away.

[AnnaE]

Should even even retina docs know these are dangerous"

[AnnaE]

I told a retina doc about migraine flashes and he said that he is not know what that was.