Symptoms of Retinitis
Itching in the eye or around it
Redness of the eye
Sensitivity to light
Pain in the eyes
The causes:
Allergic reactions
Injury to the eye
Skin diseases around the eye
Treatment:
The best treatment is prevention. You can prevent retinitis by avoiding its causes, such as: By not rubbing your eyes and applying gentle pressure instead of pinching it when you get an itch. Complicated cases may require surgery to remove the affected part of the tissue from the retina. Vision problems that will happen if left untreated are:
Blindness in one or both eyes
Retinopathy (Damages to blood vessels of the retina)
Diabetic Retinopathy (Retina damage due to diabetes) Macular Degeneration (Damage to the macula which leads to blindness) Cataract (Abnormal clouding of the lens of the eye)
Symptoms:
In most cases, the patient might be unaware of having this disease because most people with diabetes do not have any early symptoms.
Some of the general signs and symptoms include:
– Decreased vision, blurring of vision, swelling of feet and legs, weight loss, increased thirst, and hunger.
retinitis causes:-
Vitamin A deficiency is the most common cause of retinitis. Increased requirement of Vitamin A during times of rapid growth, like infancy and adolescence, can also play a role (e.g., menorrhagia). Prematurity is also associated with Vitamin A deficiency that may lead to abnormal development or degeneration of the retina. Alcoholism severely depletes Vitamin A stores in the body because it interferes with absorption and metabolism.
The combination of smoking and alcohol (and probably other factors) depletes the body’s store of Vitamin A. Inadequate dietary intake or fat malabsorption can cause a deficiency state if it becomes chronic. In addition, people who have cystic fibrosis tend to have lower-than-normal levels of fat-soluble vitamins (including Vitamin A).
Vitamin A deficiency is associated with the following conditions:
tuberculosis; measles; whooping cough; primary HIV infection (AIDS); untreated febrile diseases like pneumonia, influenza, and malaria in children; post-surgical trauma in malnourished children in developing countries; Crohn’s disease in children in developed countries; cystic fibrosis.
It may also result from poor nutrition or malabsorption caused by bowel resection or other gastrointestinal problems associated with peptic ulceration or chronic pancreatitis. Another rare cause is Gilbert’s syndrome due to the reduced capacity for converting beta-carotene to retinol.
Excess vitamin A causes toxicity through interference with protein metabolism (teeth and bones), which can produce hair loss, bone pain, hypercalcemia, thickening of the skin on the palms of hands, and soles of feet with desquamation, liver enlargement with hepatocellular damage, or erythema multiforme.
The mode of action is not well understood for this disease which results in corneal ulceration leading to blindness. The accumulation of retinol in the retina may result from delayed clearance due to impaired hepatic uptake.
Defective cellular transport processes could play a role as there is reduced binding activity by retinal cell membranes associated with mutations in ATP-binding cassette transporter proteins ABCR which leads to defective transport of retinol into the cell. Defects in proteins involved in phospholipid uptake and intracellular trafficking may also be genetic causes of this disease.
symptoms of retinitis pigmentosa:
The major symptoms of RP begin to appear during the first decade of life, usually between five and ten years. The child’s visual acuity will be 20/100 or worse in both eyes. Beginning with the periphery, the field of vision slowly diminishes as photoreceptor cells deteriorate and die off. This is accompanied by a progressive curtailment in some visual fields (macular degeneration) leading to tunnel vision and central blindness.
WHO classifies Retinitis Pigmentosa into:
Classification based on genetic cause: Retinitis pigmentosa (RP) is an autosomal dominant disease that can be inherited from either parent; though certain forms may also occur sporadically. Furthermore, it has been linked to chromosome 13 and chromosome 3 loci, as well as multiple genes on those chromosomes
Classification based on phenotypic features: Onset should be before age 40 and the degree of visual impairment must be greater than 15/200. There should also be peripheral field loss and no obvious fundus abnormalities, such as cystoid macular edema.
Retinitis pigmentosa age of onset:
Classification based on mechanism of disease:
Genetic retinitis pigmentosa is classified as rod-cone dystrophy (RCD), pigmentary degeneration (PD), and combined RCD and PD.
retinitis pigmentosa cause:
homeopathic remedy for Retinitis Pigmentosa:
Aconite Napellus 3x – The white star-shaped flowers grow up to 10 cm high with softly hairy stems; the leaves are dark green, leathery, and deeply indented at the edges. Aconite has a strong pungent taste and smells like that of its toxic cousin aconite or monkshood. It is a highly poisonous herb but homeopaths use it in minute doses and inject it in the range of XM and M (3x and 6x potency). The persons with Aconite may be very timid, timid, and shy by nature.
They like to hide from the outer world. Their hands carry a yellowish hue due to jaundice. These people are perfectionists who strive hard to get something done perfectly; often their work remains incomplete due to their over-anal attitude towards things around them.
symptoms of CMV by retinitis:
Symptoms of cytomegalovirus retinitis include the following:
Blind spots in your vision (scotomas)
Sensitivity to light (photophobia) and floaters (macular edema)
Reduced visual acuity and blurred vision (can’t see things clearly, loss of central or side vision).
Improper sleep patterns due to pain, discomfort, and inflammation. The most common symptom is photophobia which is a sensitivity to light that can appear as flashing lights, seeing streaks of light like lightning, watery eyes. After sunrise and before sunset it becomes unbearable for patients to open their eyes because of intense pain and severe photophobia.
Since CMV is usually contracted to share saliva through kissing, from a cold sore, from touching the eyes with unclean hands, etc. Some symptoms of cytomegalovirus retinitis can be difficult to identify because they resemble symptoms of other diseases such as iritis or uveitis.
Retinitis pigmentosa treatment:
In rare cases, surgery may improve vision in patients who have CMV retinitis and cystoid macular edema (swelling of the retina). This is carried out by removing fluid that has accumulated in the front portion of your eye. If treatment for cytomegalovirus is needed, a doctor will prescribe antiviral medications which are used to treat infections caused by this virus. They include ganciclovir (Cytovene, Vitrasert), foscarnet (Foscavir), cidofovir (Vistide), and valganciclovir.
signs and symptoms of retinitis pigmentosa:
The most common symptom of RP is night blindness or nyctalopia. In addition to reduced visual acuity and sensitivity to light, patients may experience color vision loss as well as a constriction of the visual field.
In some cases, RP begins with reduced visual acuity, but other symptoms can appear without warning and progress rapidly. Some types of RP have been linked to a specific chromosomal region, while others do not follow a pattern of inheritance.