RETINOBLASTOMA IN A MAN AGED FORTY‐EIGHT YEARS

Glioma retinae is an affection which occurs almost exclusively in children during the first years of life. Normally it is regarded as not being met with in adults, Winterstein thus among 429 cases finds no more than 10 patients above 9 years of age, the oldest patient being 16 years old. Similar findings are reported by other authors, two thirds of the cases as a rule being found in children below 3 years of age. Maghy in 1919 reported a case of bilateral glioma in a 20 year old woman, one of whose eyes had been removed at the age of 2, whereas the vision of the fellow eye had begun to decrease at the age of 13. Gerard & Detroy in 1926 reported a case observed in a 66 year old woman, and Gerard & Morel described a case in a 35 year old man; according to Verhoeff’s investigations, however, there was a question of retinal gliosis and not of malign tumours. In 1929 Verhoeff reported a case of retinoblastoma in a 48 year old man, the first reliable report of its occurrence in adults. In 1933 Wosnesenskaya reported the case of a 20 year old woman, whereas Maiuchi in 1935 reported that of a 19 year old woman whose eye had been amaurotic since her 9th year, however. Oribe & Malbrau in 1939 reported another case in an adult. To these few cases will be added one which was examined in tha eye department of the Kommunehospital in Copenhagen in 1942.