(Liste) Vitreous Humor Floaters

If you notice a sudden increase in eye floaters contact an eye specialist immediately especially if you also see light flashes or lose your peripheral vision.

Vitreous humor floaters. They are also called muscae volitantes or mouches volantes. The vitreous usually starts out transparent but imperfections may gradually develop as one ages. Symptomatic patients who are candidates for treatment report impairment in vision with a specific activity for example with reading watching television or driving and this complaint should be documented in the medical record. They seem to appear and disappear for no apparent reason. Vitreous floaters are commonly seen in the elderly and this arises from age related changes in the vitreous humor it liquefies and contracts to some extent thereby pulling the retina with it. Floaters are sometimes visible deposits within the eye s vitreous humour which is normally transparent or between the vitreous and retina. Eye floaters are small pieces of debris that float in the eye s vitreous humor.

Vitreous floaters are a common visual experience for almost everyone at some point in their lives. Each floater can be measured by its size shape consistency refractive index and motility. This debris casts shadows onto the retina the light sensitive tissue layer at the back of the eye. The floaters or vitreous opacities should be correlated with the patient s symptoms on a thorough fundus examination. Most floaters are small flecks of a protein called collagen. The vitreous chamber is the largest cavity in the eye which makes the vitreous humour the most prominent liquid in the eye. As the vitreous shrinks it becomes somewhat stringy and the strands can cast tiny shadows on the retina.

Microscopic fibers within the vitreous tend to clump and can cast tiny shadows on your retina. As you age the protein fibers that make up the. For most people the condition is a benign temporary phenomenon. The common type of floater present in most people s eyes is due to these degenerative changes of the vit. If you have eye floaters it is these shadows that you see floating across your field of vision. Present at birth it changes little until we enter our fifth decade when it begins to shrink which can lead to disorders ranging from harmless floaters to a vision impairing retinal detachment. Floaters occur when the vitreous a gel like substance that fills about 80 percent of the eye and helps it maintain a round shape slowly shrinks.

The shadows you see are called floaters.