1997 Volume 37 Issue 6 Pages 433-438
The patient was a 12-year-old boy. He hit his head and right eye with an iron goal post playing football in his gymnastic class. He went to an ophthalmologist the next day and was diagnosed to have a traumatic optic neuritis. His visual acuity at the first visit was 0.05 (right) and 0.4 (left) . He had normal visual acuity before the accident. He had improved his visual acuity after being treated by a series of intravenous steroid injections during his hospitalization for 40 days. His visual acuity became 0.4 (right) and 1.0 (left) at the discharge. After that, he went back to school for a week ; however, he couldn't attend classes because of his visual difficulties. He suffered from right blepharoptosis and weak left visual ability (0.05). There were no organic findings for his amblyopia or his ptosis. He was referred to the psychiatric department of the hospital because his visual signs were suspected to be psychogenic. The patient's amblyopia continued and made no obvious progress for more than 5 months, so he was referred to the Department of Psychosomatic Medicine of Kyushu University Hospital. When he was admitted, he had bilateral amblyopia, spiral contraction of visual field and right blepharoptosis. We did not medicate any psychotropic drugs. The therapy was client-centered psychotherapy. A team approach was also undertaken in the process of this therapy. His visual ability improved gradually and finally recovered the acuity of 1.0 (right) and 1.2 (left) in the 7 month treatment during the hospitalization.
