Optic glioma

Injury	Disease	Nutrition	Poison

Symptoms	Surgery	Test	Special Topic

Neurofibromatosis I, enlarged optic foramen

Overview

Symptoms

Treatment

Prevention

Optic glioma

Alternative Names:

Glioma - optic; Optic nerve glioma

Symptoms:

The symptoms are due to the tumor growing and pressing on the optic nerve and adjacent structures. These symptoms can include:

Vision loss in one or both eyes that leads to eventual blindness. The vision loss can be general, or it can be a decrease in the visual fields, such as a loss of peripheral vision.
Squinting.
Involuntary eyeball movement.
One or both eyes may bulge outward.

The patient may show symptoms of Diencephalic syndrome, which includes delayed growth, loss of appetite and body fat, daytime sleeping and decreased memory and intellectual capacities.

Signs and tests:

A neurologic examination reveals a loss of vision in one or both eyes. There may be changes in the optic nerve, including swelling or scarring of the nerve, or paleness and atrophy of the optic disk.

The tumor may extend into deeper locations of the brain. There may be signs of increased pressure within the brain (intracranial pressure). There may be signs of NF1.

The following tests may be performed:

Head CT scan or MRI of the head -- confirms the diagnosis and the exact location of the tumor
Cerebral angiography -- often not necessary, but if used, it shows a space-occupying mass
Visual field tests -- can help determine how invasive the tumor is
Tissue removed from the tumor during surgery or CT scan-guided biopsy -- examined to confirm the exact type of tumor.

Review Date: 8/14/2004
Reviewed By: Luc Jasmin, MD, PhD, Department of Neurological Surgery, University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, CA. Review provided by VeriMed Healthcare Network.

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