Frosted Branch Angiitis

Overview

In January 2002, thirty-eight years old healthy man with unusual clinical signs ofvasculitis was examined in the Center for Diagnosis and Treatment of Uveitis inour Department of Ophthalmology. The patient had a flu-like disease one monthbefore the signs of the eye disease started. In the beginning of the disease, thevisual acuity (VA) was 6/12 (20/40 or 0.5) for distance and Jaeger 8 for near and 6/6(20/20 or 1.0) and Jaeger 1 respectively. The clinical appearance was similar to thisof frosted branch angiitis. The thorough medical examination did not discoverlink between vasculitis and any systemic disease. Serologic examination discoveredpositivity of IgG imunoglobulin antibody against cytomegalovirus (CMV) only.The intraocular fluid sampling to confirm CMV antibody presence was denied bythe patient. After starting the treatment with gancyclovirus and corticosteroids,the considerable improvement of clinical signs of the frosted branch angiitis wasnoticed. VA improved after five days of treatment. During one-year follow-up,neither recurrence of vasculitis nor the decline of VA of both eyes was marked.In Czech ophthalmologic literature,we did not find any article referring to frostedbranch angiitis, so we took the liberty of offering the Czech term “syndromomrzlých větví retinálních cév“.

Key words:
frosted branch angiitis, posterior uveitis.