Clinical and multimodal imaging characteristics of acute Vogt–Koyanagi–Harada disease unassociated with clinically evident exudative retinal detachment

The purpose of this study was to describe the clinical and multimodal imaging findings in acute Vogt–Koyanagi–Harada (VKH) disease without clinically evident exudative retinal detachment (ERD). We retrospectively reviewed the charts of 18 patients (36 eyes), diagnosed with acute VKH disease without clinically evident ERD. All patients underwent complete ophthalmic examination, fundus photography, optical coherence tomography (OCT), B-scan ultrasonography, fluorescein angiography (FA), and indocyanine green angiography (ICGA). Of 18 patients, twelve (66.7 %) were female and 6 (33.3 %) were male. Mean age was 39 years (range, 23–60). Ten patients had been referred with an erroneous diagnosis of primary optic nerve disorder (8; 44.4 %) or isolated anterior uveitis (2; 11.1 %). Anterior chamber or vitreous inflammatory reaction was noted in 22 eyes (61.1 %), each. Fundus findings included optic disc swelling in 30 eyes (83.3 %), retinal striae in 20 eyes (55.5 %), and yellowish deep lesions in 3 eyes (8.3 %). OCT showed a shallow, localized subclinical ERD in 18 eyes (50 %), and retinal pigment epithelial folds in 23 eyes (63.9 %). B-scan ultrasonography showed diffuse, low- to medium-reflective choroidal thickening in all eyes. FA disclosed delayed choroidal perfusion in at least one eye of all patients (100 %), mild pinpoint leakage in 21 eyes (58.3 %), optic disc hyperfluorescence in 35 eyes (97.2 %) and choroidal folds in 13 eyes (36.1 %). ICGA findings included delayed choroidal perfusion in 24 eyes (66.7 %), decrease in the number of large choroidal vessels in 36 eyes (100 %), fuzzy choroidal vessels in 35 eyes (97.2 %), and hypofluorescent dark dots in 28 eyes (77.8 %). The association of bilateral optic disc edema with retinal striae and intraocular inflammatory reaction highly suggests acute VKH disease. A multimodal imaging approach including fundus photography, OCT, B-scan ultrasonography, FA, and ICGA provides important clues for the definite diagnosis and help differentiate VKH disease from primary optic nerve disorders.