Vascular tufts of the pupillary border causing a spontaneous hyphaema.

In 3 patients a spontaneous haemorrhage in the anterior chamber originated from vascular tufts at the pupillary border. These vascular tufts were hardly visible by slitlamp observation, but could be visualized well with fluorescein angiography. The patients were aged 50 years or more and in 2 of them the vascular tufts were found in both eyes. The haemorrhages disappeared spontaneously under conservative therapy and only in 1 case caused a transient glaucoma. Of 115 randomly chosen out-patients, 4 cases were found with the same vascular tufts on the pupillary border, but without any symptom. All the patients who had vascular tufts, with or without haemorrhage in the anterior chamber, were in the sixth decade or older. We think that these vascular lesions are caused by cardiovascular diseases and by elevated venous pressure caused by intrathoracic processes. Diabetes and intraocular diseases were excluded in our patients.