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JEROME T. PEARLMAN, MD; JOAN SAXTON, MD
Los Angeles

JAMA. 1975;231(8):810.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

To the Editor.—

It has long been the clinical impression of ophthalmologists familiar with retinal pigmentary degeneration (retinitis pigmentosa) that some women suffering from this slowly progressive and potentially blinding disease have an accelerated loss of periphal visual field during pregnancy. (An analagous situation would be the more rapid progression of diabetic retinopathy during pregnancy.) The mechanism of this phenomenon remains obscure, but hormonal factors are suspected.

Documentation of this clinical observation is difficult, because only one reference¹ is commonly cited. Although no controlled studies have been made to support the contention that pregnancy exacerbates the symptoms of retinitis pigmentosa, the clinical impression still remains that some women lose vision more rapidly during pregnancy (A. E. Krill, personal communication, 1971). If this is the case, attention should be given to the theoretic danger of prescribing birth control pills to women with retinitis pigmentosa.

Birth control pills are widely used . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

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