What were your symptoms of Pars Planitis or Uveitis?

[J-er]

My eyes hav been weird for about 3 months now. Just wondering. Had floaters and light sensitivity.

[Moldy Oldy]

Right There With You

My eyes have gotten so bad that I wear sunglasses in my home, and put on my "movie star" windshield sunglasses if I leave home. My neuro wants to do tests, but my eyes are so light sensitive that the tests cannot be done. Was given op neuritis when I was diagnosed 3 yrs. ago, and have only short periods when it wasn't a big issue -- always when I was receiving the steroids. Please let me know if you hear new ideas/solutions from your drs.

[J-er]

My eyes have gotten so bad that I wear sunglasses in my home, and put on my "movie star" windshield sunglasses if I leave home. My neuro wants to do tests, but my eyes are so light sensitive that the tests cannot be done. Was given op neuritis when I was diagnosed 3 yrs. ago, and have only short periods when it wasn't a big issue -- always when I was receiving the steroids. Please let me know if you hear new ideas/solutions from your drs.

Hi Moldy Oldy.
What are your symptoms? Do you have uveitis? Are they doing anything for it?
Basically, my first opth said unless my vision was blurry, they would not do anything for it. Since they would do steroids, and that could make your vision worse. I am going for a second opinion next month. By the way, I am still in limboland in terms of a MS dx.

[DonnaG]

Hi!
My first signs have always been PAIN. Feels like a deep headache that just wont go away. It you shift your eyes back and forth it just hurts. Light sensitivity is the second most common issue for me. I need to wear my sunglasses everywhere (even at night, sorry, 80's reference..)

Hope it gets better for you, but I strongly recommend getting it checked sooner rather than later.

[ladibabe]

Pars Planitis

I wrote on this cite some time last year about my onset of Pars Planitis. I have a reoccurring active infection. I took some time out and found a cite that was very interesting regarding the correlation between MS and PP. It is not as rare as many think.

http://www.uveitis.org/patients/support/parsplantis-org

I don't have pain, I do have light sensitivity and have for at least 2 years. My main symptom is floaters.. Floaters of all shapes and sizes. I get between 1 and 20 in my field vision.

I am not sure if this is an exacerbation for me?

[22cyclist]

I have that too but my neuro-ophthalmologist thought it had nothing to do with it but everything to do with my rosecea. People with MS get all sorts of weird feet things, but are you running or jogging? If so, I would see a PT about it. Your neurologist probably won't know much about the uveitis problem, so go see an MD eye doctor for that and ask if it can be related to MS. Then call your neuro, let he/she know what the eye doctor said, and go from there with your second problem. Hopefully you will get some answers soon.

Let us know how it goes!
Lisa

[J-er]

I wrote on this cite some time last year about my onset of Pars Planitis. I have a reoccurring active infection. I took some time out and found a cite that was very interesting regarding the correlation between MS and PP. It is not as rare as many think.

http://www.uveitis.org/patients/support/parsplantis-org

I don't have pain, I do have light sensitivity and have for at least 2 years. My main symptom is floaters.. Floaters of all shapes and sizes. I get between 1 and 20 in my field vision.

I am not sure if this is an exacerbation for me?

HI ladibabe and 22cyclist!
Did the neuro or opth do anything for your eyes? Basically for me, I have now been to three opthamalagists, and not one of them can find something wrong with my eyes. They have been like this for over a year now. (in terms of MS, still in limboland). I even begged one of the opth for steroids for my eyes, and he looked at me like I was crazy! (which I may be!!) He basically said even if I have a very mild inflammation, he wasn't going to do anything for them since the steroids could do more bad than good. Other than going back in 3 months, its a wait and see approach. But other than the floaters and light sensitivity, my eyes are perfect. can still see perfect. So there is my dilemma.

[ladibabe]

treatment

HI ladibabe and 22cyclist!
Did the neuro or opth do anything for your eyes? Basically for me, I have now been to three opthamalagists, and not one of them can find something wrong with my eyes. They have been like this for over a year now. (in terms of MS, still in limboland). I even begged one of the opth for steroids for my eyes, and he looked at me like I was crazy! (which I may be!!) He basically said even if I have a very mild inflammation, he wasn't going to do anything for them since the steroids could do more bad than good. Other than going back in 3 months, its a wait and see approach. But other than the floaters and light sensitivity, my eyes are perfect. can still see perfect. So there is my dilemma.

Each flare up I have had, I was given a red top and pink top drops. The red top kind of opens my pupil to help relieve eye pressure and the pink drop is the steroid. I have an appointment tomorrow to go over other options. I don't want the injections and I don't want the operation. I think I will opt for the oral steroid first to see how that works.

I have pain now so I know its getting worse, my eyes have always been sensitive to light but now my vision is hazy and blurry.

[jreagan70]

Hi J-er:

I've been reading your posts and, as a person with TONS of floaters, I think that if you've been to 3 ophthalmologists and all 3 of them say there's nothing wrong with your eyes, you can rest assured that there's nothing wrong with your eyes. With your pupils dilated, eye doctors can see virtually everything inside your eyes. Uveitis and pars planitis would be really obvious and they wouldn't have missed it if it were there.

Have you done much reading about floaters? MOST floaters are perfectly normal. It sounds like all 3 ophthalmologists told you that yours are the perfectly normal kind.

One of my ophthalmologists told me something interesting about floaters. He said that a lot of people think that the normal kinds of floaters only showed up at the minute they noticed them. But that isn't usually what happens. The normal kinds of floaters develop slowly over time so they're present long before some people notice them. Then finally something draws their attention to them and since they just noticed them they think they just happened. He said, "sudden discovery does not mean sudden onset."

Could that be what happened in your case? At a time you weren't feeling well you started to pay attention to your body and noticed you had floaters? That's exactly what my doctor was talking about.

So it's possible that you thought that whatever was making you not feel well caused your floaters, and that you're convinced that they're abnormal floaters (in spite of what the doctors say) because of that coincidence. And it sounds like you also think that they must be abnormal floaters and indicate some kind of condition like uveitis or pars planitis because if it wasn't they would go away. And since they haven't gone away, something must be wrong.

But if you read up on normal floaters, you'll find that they don't represent anything that is medically wrong. It's just the way the inside of the eye changes over time. And some people are actual born with a little bit of debris inside the eye. (I can't remember I time when I didn't have floaters.) But there's nothing medically wrong.

The other thing you'll find out by reading about floaters is that these normal floaters don't go away. There's nowhere for them to go. They may change over time and you might not notice them as much, but they don't go away. That's just how floaters are. So if your floaters are still there, it doesn't mean that there's anything medically wrong.

So if 3 different ophthalmologists have told you that there's nothing wrong and that your floaters aren't the kind caused by a disease or injury, you can believe them. It sounds like you just have normal floaters that you made some incorrect assumptions about, and that's why it doesn't make sense to you that the ophthalmologists can't find anything wrong.

And since the ophthalmologists have supported that your assumptions are wrong about what your floaters are and what they represent, it might also be that what you think of as "light sensitivity" is different than what doctors consider to be "light sensitivity," so that's why they can't find any evidence of that, either.

If you had uveitis, you would know it by the pain and hazy vision. But you said that your vision is fine. And your eye doctors would know it because it would be obvious when they looked at your eyes.

Of course if you get new floaters, you should get those checked out by the ophthalmologist because new floaters could be something different.

Feel better about your eyes?

[J-er]

Hi J-er:

I've been reading your posts and, as a person with TONS of floaters, I think that if you've been to 3 ophthalmologists and all 3 of them say there's nothing wrong with your eyes, you can rest assured that there's nothing wrong with your eyes. With your pupils dilated, eye doctors can see virtually everything inside your eyes. Uveitis and pars planitis would be really obvious and they wouldn't have missed it if it were there.

Have you done much reading about floaters? MOST floaters are perfectly normal. It sounds like all 3 ophthalmologists told you that yours are the perfectly normal kind.

One of my ophthalmologists told me something interesting about floaters. He said that a lot of people think that the normal kinds of floaters only showed up at the minute they noticed them. But that isn't usually what happens. The normal kinds of floaters develop slowly over time so they're present long before some people notice them. Then finally something draws their attention to them and since they just noticed them they think they just happened. He said, "sudden discovery does not mean sudden onset."

Could that be what happened in your case? At a time you weren't feeling well you started to pay attention to your body and noticed you had floaters? That's exactly what my doctor was talking about.

So it's possible that you thought that whatever was making you not feel well caused your floaters, and that you're convinced that they're abnormal floaters (in spite of what the doctors say) because of that coincidence. And it sounds like you also think that they must be abnormal floaters and indicate some kind of condition like uveitis or pars planitis because if it wasn't they would go away. And since they haven't gone away, something must be wrong.

But if you read up on normal floaters, you'll find that they don't represent anything that is medically wrong. It's just the way the inside of the eye changes over time. And some people are actual born with a little bit of debris inside the eye. (I can't remember I time when I didn't have floaters.) But there's nothing medically wrong.

The other thing you'll find out by reading about floaters is that these normal floaters don't go away. There's nowhere for them to go. They may change over time and you might not notice them as much, but they don't go away. That's just how floaters are. So if your floaters are still there, it doesn't mean that there's anything medically wrong.

So if 3 different ophthalmologists have told you that there's nothing wrong and that your floaters aren't the kind caused by a disease or injury, you can believe them. It sounds like you just have normal floaters that you made some incorrect assumptions about, and that's why it doesn't make sense to you that the ophthalmologists can't find anything wrong.

And since the ophthalmologists have supported that your assumptions are wrong about what your floaters are and what they represent, it might also be that what you think of as "light sensitivity" is different than what doctors consider to be "light sensitivity," so that's why they can't find any evidence of that, either.

If you had uveitis, you would know it by the pain and hazy vision. But you said that your vision is fine. And your eye doctors would know it because it would be obvious when they looked at your eyes.

Of course if you get new floaters, you should get those checked out by the ophthalmologist because new floaters could be something different.

Feel better about your eyes?

Hi jreagan,
Thanks for the reply. And yes, I do feel better about them. And actually after each appt I had, I felt better about them, but then as time passes, and I think they get worse, I always think they missed something. BUT I guess after having them dilated 4 times over the last 12 months, I had better start believing them. Guess I will just wait to see what they say in another 6 months!