Last week I suffered from a sudden blurred vision in 1 eye that lasted 12hours.  I had it checked from a optomologist which in the meantime I called my neurologist.  The neurologist finally called back and advised me to restart my aggrenox, which he had taken me off in June because he said my blood flow was doing great.  I did experience and increase in TIAs about 2 months after and this happened, but to boot it happened on the side that I never get symptoms.  I was kind of upset when the neurologist did not want to order any MRIs....has anyone had this type of symptom before? 

You might want to take a look at this article regarding "Steal Effect"; http://www.nature.com/jcbfm/journal/v21/n2/full/9591052a.html

Here's an except:

Intracerebral steal, a term popularized by Symon (Symon, 1968), refers to the paradoxical decrease of flow in the ischemic areas in response to vasodilator stimuli (Brawley et al., 1967; Hoedt et al., 1967). This behavior is attributed to shunting of blood flow away from nonautoregulating ischemic areas by the action of normally reactive vessels. The term "steal" has been suggested to be misleading because the underlying mechanism is rooted in a decrease in perfusion pressure (Wade and Hachinski, 1987). The concept of steal has been questioned and attributed to other sources such as a decrease in arterial pressure (Gogolak et al., 1985). Clinical studies have shown that the phenomenon has an ephemeral nature and can be documented only in a small proportion of patients and only in limited areas (Nariai et al., 1998; Olesen and Paulson, 1971). Furthermore, the demonstration of the effectiveness of the "inverse steal," by attempting to increase the flow in ischemic areas by vasoconstriction on normally autoregulating brain regions, has not been straightforward in head-injured patients (Darby et al., 1988; Roberts et al., 1998).

I had a neurlogist take me off of Aggrenox (Dipyridamole) because he thought it might cause this steal effect in a Moyamoya brain.
Kim

My daughter has MMD and for two years prior to her surgery she had left eye blindness that would come and go.  We saw an Opthamologist who did testing and a cat scan and found nothing wrong.  After her surgery, the problem went away. 

Corinne

ntrlpwr wrote on Nov 4^th, 2010 at 5:08am:

Last week I suffered from a sudden blurred vision in 1 eye that lasted 12hours.  I had it checked from a optomologist which in the meantime I called my neurologist.  The neurologist finally called back and advised me to restart my aggrenox, which he had taken me off in June because he said my blood flow was doing great.  I did experience and increase in TIAs about 2 months after and this happened, but to boot it happened on the side that I never get symptoms.  I was kind of upset when the neurologist did not want to order any MRIs....has anyone had this type of symptom before?

This has also been happening to me for a little over a month. My neuro had my opthamologist perform a vision field test and I had a VEP...I've also had numerous EEG, MRI and CT...everything appears normal, but I have really bad headaches everyday and I have been getting very dizzy.  I'm not on aggrenox. I take Keppra, Plavix, aspirin, lipitor, and metoprolol. 

I have a rather pronounced blind spot, discovered during a vision field test. It doesn't bother me, and have learned to move my eyes and head so as to see everything while driving.

KTiller wrote on Nov 7^th, 2010 at 1:35pm:

You might want to take a look at this article regarding "Steal Effect"; http://www.nature.com/jcbfm/journal/v21/n2/full/9591052a.html Here's an except: Intracerebral steal, a term popularized by Symon (Symon, 1968), refers to the paradoxical decrease of flow in the ischemic areas in response to vasodilator stimuli (Brawley et al., 1967; Hoedt et al., 1967). This behavior is attributed to shunting of blood flow away from nonautoregulating ischemic areas by the action of normally reactive vessels. The term "steal" has been suggested to be misleading because the underlying mechanism is rooted in a decrease in perfusion pressure (Wade and Hachinski, 1987). The concept of steal has been questioned and attributed to other sources such as a decrease in arterial pressure (Gogolak et al., 1985). Clinical studies have shown that the phenomenon has an ephemeral nature and can be documented only in a small proportion of patients and only in limited areas (Nariai et al., 1998; Olesen and Paulson, 1971). Furthermore, the demonstration of the effectiveness of the "inverse steal," by attempting to increase the flow in ischemic areas by vasoconstriction on normally autoregulating brain regions, has not been straightforward in head-injured patients (Darby et al., 1988; Roberts et al., 1998). I had a neurlogist take me off of Aggrenox (Dipyridamole) because he thought it might cause this steal effect in a Moyamoya brain. Kim

Hi Kim,
so you have moyamoya and also this "steal" affect? what others types of symptoms did you have? 

Corinne wrote on Nov 18^th, 2010 at 10:31pm:

My daughter has MMD and for two years prior to her surgery she had left eye blindness that would come and go.  We saw an Opthamologist who did testing and a cat scan and found nothing wrong.  After her surgery, the problem went away.  Corinne

Hi Corinne,
did they think that she was suffering from TIAs?  that is what my neurologist is saying because CT and MRIs was taken and came out negative. and this is 3 years after my surgery. 

Hi
my son temporarily lost his eyesight last year and he had trouble with his leg which prompted the visit to the neurologist and the subsequent diagnosis of moyamoya. No one was able to give us a reason for the loss of eyesight, they weren't able to relate it to the moyamoya, and it hasn't happened again fortunately...

KT wrote on Dec 2^nd, 2010 at 3:33am:

Hi my son temporarily lost his eyesight last year and he had trouble with his leg which prompted the visit to the neurologist and the subsequent diagnosis of moyamoya. No one was able to give us a reason for the loss of eyesight, they weren't able to relate it to the moyamoya, and it hasn't happened again fortunately...

That's a blessing that it did not occur again!!  Yeah the MDs say i had a tia since nothing could be recorded on a CT or MRI, I too had another lost of sight with totally paralysis on the right side, so that's how they came to that conclusion. 

ntrlpwr wrote on Nov 29^th, 2010 at 12:12am:

Corinne wrote on Nov 18th, 2010 at 10:31pm: My daughter has MMD and for two years prior to her surgery she had left eye blindness that would come and go.  We saw an Opthamologist who did testing and a cat scan and found nothing wrong.  After her surgery, the problem went away.  Corinne Hi Corinne, did they think that she was suffering from TIAs?  that is what my neurologist is saying because CT and MRIs was taken and came out negative. and this is 3 years after my surgery.

After figuring out that she had moyamoya, they figured that she was and is still having TIA's.  Since her surgery in March, they are not as often or as intense but are still occuring.  She just had her check up at Stanford and they told us that her blood flow is adequate, but she had two events while we were in CA.  They don't last long and she does regain all that is lost during the TIA.  Still scary but much better since surgery.

My daughter, Amanda-diagnosed with MM in 09, was seeing "spots" and had her surgery March 2010-a bilateral pial synangiosis, still sees spots.  She's had her vision checked twice and it is perfect.  She describes the spots as clear , sand like dots that do not get in the way of her reading or drawing or anything.  Don't understand it all but she was also seen by a Retina specialist and it is believed to be a cause of the blood flow near the frontal area of the brain.  It may never go away, and it doesn't seem to bother her because she never mentions it, we always ask her if she is still seeing spots!  She will be 9years old in February.
TAmmy (amanda's mom)