Eye involvement in AIDS

: Between 1984 and 1987 (over two-and-a-half years) 30 hospitalized patients with HIV infections of different degrees of severity were ophthalmologically examined. Ocular involvement was found in 17 patients (approx. 57%). In 16 of these 17 patients with pathologic ophthalmologic findings (approx. 94%), AIDS was already fully developed. Ocular involvement is therefore a sign of poor prognosis. Fourteen patients had a microvascular retinal syndrome and four patients had infectious (chorio-)retinitis (causative organisms: cytomegalovirus in three cases, Cryptococcus neoformans in one). Further findings included sicca syndrome with superficial punctate keratitis in two cases, keratitis in one patient with generalized mucocutaneous candidiasis, Kaposi's sarcoma of the eyelids in two cases, Kaposi's sarcoma of the conjunctiva in one case, papilledema with cryptococcal meningitis in one case, and atypical hordeolum in one case. Morphologic and pathogenetic aspects of the ophthalmologic findings, their importance and course in AIDS patients, and therapeutic problems are discussed.