Suprasellar tumors and incidental optic disc anomalies. Diagnostic problems in two patients with hemianopic temporal scotomas

J. R. Keane

Anomalous optic discs may be associated with relative temporal visual field defects that need to be distinguished from bitemporal field defects of chiasmal compression. Two patients with both anomalous discs and suprasellar tumors were hospitalized with temporal hemianopic scotomatous visual field defects. A 19-year-old woman with a chromophobe adenoma had a monocular temporal hemianopic scotoma in the eye exhibiting an inferior-nasal disc crescent. A 22-year-old man with a hypothalamic-chiasmal germinoma causing bitemporal hemianopic scotomas had minor disc colobomas bilaterally. Careful study of the optic discs and posterior fundus, as well as evaluation of the characteristics of the temporal field defects, should distinguish chiasmal compression in the occasional case where suprasellar tumor and anomalous optic discs coincide.