Persistent phosphene - should I worry?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I learned from this site that the light show you see when you rub your eyes is called a phosphene. Neat.

This morning I rubbed my eyes before getting out of bed - saw the brightest phosphene I’ve ever seen. When I stopped rubbing, the image stayed. And stayed. I could tell it was very slowly fading, but man what a scare! The blob eradicated a good third of my field of vision - dead centre!

After about 3 min it finally faded to imperceptible. Phew!
Posterior Vitreous Detachment
I’ve tried to google what this could mean, but everything talks about flashing lights due to posterior vitreous detachment - or a floater that is still attached, flapping like a flag and tugging the retina. This doesn’t seem to describe what happened this morning. As I type this, I see no remnants of this morning’s light show.

My question is: WTF? Should I worry? Or is this just as harmless (or harmful) as any other time I’ve rubbed my eyes, just longer lasting but no damage done?

2

Sounds like a retinal migrane. I’ve had a few, although I haven’t had any in several years. My doctor was not too concerned when I described them to him. For me, the effect was similar to a large phosphene, partially obscuring my vision. Interestingly, it was quite difficult to determine which eye it was in, because I could see it with my eyes both open and closed. Mine would last around half an hour or so.

3

Probably couldn’t hurt to call your optometrist/ophthalmologist and ask them. They’ll know whether or not you need to come in and get checked out or not.

4

Since this is about a specific medical case, it’s better suited to IMHO than GQ.

Colibri
General Questions Moderator

5

I agree calling a doctor is prudent. But I wouldn’t worry about it since it went away.

I’ve had it happen to me simply due to sleeping wrong. It’s like a pinched nerve. I talked to the doctor about it once, and he told me it wasn’t anything to worry about unless, again, it became permanent, was getting progressively worse, or was accompanied by other symptoms.

6

IANA doctor. YMMV. Void where prohibited. Allow 6-8 weeks for delivery.

Some years ago I discovered phosphenes when I rubbed my eye in a totally dark room. This freaked me out. I went to a doc, who referred me to a specialist, who said this happens a lot, normal stuff. GP’s referral wasn’t OMG, you have EYE CANCER! but rather, hey, your eyes are important so let’s just get a definitive answer because the earlier you catch things the better.

But here in the last year I’ve been seeing bursts of light without even touching my eyes, e.g. closing my eyes to sleep. Well, “bursts” isn’t the best term. What I see is more liquid. Hard to explain. Anywhoo…

As I understand it, over time the vitreous in your eye breaks down. To illustrate imagine you make a bowl of jello. You know how sometimes it comes out watery? Some of that is solid, some not, and there are varying degrees between. The vitreous in your eye becomes kind of like that as you age—my doc said it’s thicker, like vaseline but yeah, not uniform. What used to move smoothly and easily across your retina…that heavier, thicker part of the jello no longer does. It clings and when it pulls on your retina, your brain interprets that as a burst of light where this is none.

Now let’s talk about floaters. These are bits of debris that clump together. I guess some come from the retina, and I first noticed them when I was 17 or so If you’re seeing flashes of light -plus- a storm of floaters, as it was explained to me, that’s bad. Too much pulling and tearing on the retina I guess. Doc told me that the brain sort of "subtracts out’ old ones, much like your brain ignores the smell of onion if you’ve been cooking it all day. So a storm of “new” ones with the flashes, that’s bad.

They can do (laser?) surgery to fix it. But mostly, if you’re at the jello point of breakdown (for lack of a better term), get used to it. It’s normal, sucks to grow old stuff.

OTOH, getting it checked out gives the medical pros a baseline to work from.

IIRC someone in SDMB said that her/his doc said that our bodies are designed for about 45 years and after that the doctor’s job is to manage the decline…

7

Did it leave behind a subtle, smoky shadow? It may be too faint to notice except against a bright white background. 10 years ago I saw a heck of a bright phosphene, and it left behind a shadow that persists to this day. After consulting several experts, finally I learnt it is AMN. I am not saying you have it, but be sure to monitor for a smoky shadow around the area of the phosphene, and if you see anything strange get with the best eye doctor you know of (these ischemic conditions are extremely hard to diagnose - based on personal experience).

More benignly, experienced meditators can see long-lasting, ultra-bright phosphenes. These resolve without trouble.

8

MHO: If this keeps happening, see an eye doctor. Otherwise, a one-time thing is probably not anything to worry about.

I had really bad floaters for a short time several years ago. They didn’t last, fortunately. Now, if you see bright lights in a large field of vision, call 911 because it could be a retinal detachment.

9

What I get, in addition to other things, is a tiny point of light moving across my field of vision. It moves in random paths, like you’d see from a laser pointer for a cat. I’ve mentioned this to two ophthalmologists, and they don’t have a clue.

10

Thanks all for the thoughts, observations, opinions.

I was worried (still am a bit) but I, like, just saw my eye doctor less than a week ago. She didn’t see anything after quite a battery of tests, exams, etc. I’m going back in a couple of weeks to pick up my new glasses (slight prescription change) and really considered making an appointment earlier. Because it resolved on its own and there’s no trace, I feel it’s safe to wait.

11

The closest I’ve had to that is a kind of glowy squiggle as part of the early aura of a migraine. I bring it up because that would be a brain issue, which might be why eye doctors wouldn’t find it.

I don’t even think most doctors would do anything about it if you don’t get the pain symptoms. Though they might do a brain MRI just to be sure there’s nothing else wrong.

12

Yeah, like BigT said, migraine. I used to think these “shooting stars” across my field of vision was a warning that a migraine was coming but apparently they’re actually considered evidence of a migraine already in progress in their own right. Not all migraines hurt the same amount, and some don’t hurt at all but have just the tiniest of auras like this.

13

But I also get migraine auras, which are very different from the points of light I mentioned. They begin as a small right-facing crescent of glistening gold, then get progressively larger with more intricate facets.

Is it possible to get two totally different types of migraine auras?

14

Yes and they can shift over time.

And then there is this possibility:

15

PVD sounds like a definite possibility. I’ll have to ask my ophthalmologist about it. Thanks, Boo.

16

When this latest happened, my wife said to call Teladoc. If you have that sort of service available, it’s a way to ask if you need to go to the office or not. TBH I like it—no waiting rooms etc. because COVID has made medical appt zoom meetings a thing. When it’s your eyes they’ll probably err on the side of caution. So OP, if you’re getting glasses and have a follow up, you can ask then as well. And if you have doc-in-a-box type facilities, that’s a possible resource as well.