(SHW) Professor of Neurology, Harvard Medical School; Director, Unit for Neurovisual Disorders, Massachusetts General Hospital; (DZ) Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, Maryland
This unique video of opsoclonus was made by Dr. David S. Zee at The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, who played back the record of the patient's opsoclonus onto an oscilloscope screen. The bright spot corresponds to the direction of gaze due to rapid spontaneous multidirectional saccades. Watching this video makes it clear why Cogan used the term "chaotic oscillations" to describe opsoclonus. Cogan DG. Ocular dysmetria: flutter like oscillations of the eyes and opsoclonus. Arch Ophthalmol 1954;51:318-335. For a complete overview of opsoclonus in childhood, I recommend you review all the cases in this collection. ID 166-4 Neonatal Opsoclonus ID 166-6 Parainfectious Opsoclonus ID 166-12 Opsoclonus in the Dark ID 936-1 Neonatatal Opsoclonus ID 936-8 Paraneoplastic Opsoclonus Downbeat Nystagmus ID 936-8 is a very instructive case, previously published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1995. The child presented with paraneoplastic opsoclonus due to an occult neuroblastoma. How to investigate a child with opsoclonus is fully outlined in ID936-8. Interested readers are referred to Pediatric Neuro-Ophthalmology. Editors: Brodsky MC, Baker RS, Hamed LM. Spinger-Verlag, New York, Inc. 1996.
