Inherited retinal arteriolar tortuosity with retinal hemorrhages.

BACKGROUND

Familial arteriolar tortuosity is an autosomal dominant disorder affecting the retinal arterioles.

OBJECTIVES

To report a pedigree with this disorder and describe a systemic workup to determine whether this vascular abnormality is limited to the eye.

RESULTS

A 58-year-old woman referred for retinal hemorrhages was found to have retinal arteriolar tortuosity of both eyes, especially in the macular area. Her 63-year-old brother had a history of retinal hemmorhages beginning at age 18 years and had similar fundoscopic examination findings. The proband had an extensive systemic workup, including magnetic resonance imaging, and cardiac and renal angiography, that failed to demonstrate any other sequelae of this inherited ocular syndrome. However, each member of the family expressing this phenotype did have hypertension.

CONCLUSION

Inherited retinal arteriolar tortuosity is an autosomal dominant disorder limited to the eye, at least in this pedigree, within the sensitivity of the systemic workup we used.