Why is there weird formation of characters in front of my eyes?

Question

Hello doctor,

I am a 46-year-old woman. I have floaters in my eyes that mostly occur when I wake up in the morning but these floaters are not just wiggly lines, these are characters. They take the form of animals or a marching band or cartoon characters. They have been happening for approximately one to three years and my eye doctor told me to see a psychiatrist. Another told me that was impossible to be happening. I am a migraine sufferer on quite a few medications but it has been happening before this. I am currently on Tizanidine, Amitriptyline, and Sumatriptan. Please can someone help me.

Answer 1

Hello,

Welcome to icliniq.com.

You cannot call them floaters according to your description. Those are formed hallucinations. First, you have to know whether there is any organic abnormality like parietal lobe lesions in your brain affecting thevisual pathway. I think you should undergo full visual assessments including visual acuity, visual field, color vision and also neuroimaging to look at the brain and visual pathway. Do you have other abnormal sensations like hearing voices and abnormal smell sensations? If there is noorganic abnormality, some people have synesthesia where they can hear sounds and smells due to various functional brain abnormalities and you need functional MRI (magnetic resonance imaging). Further, when you cannot find out any neurological abnormally, psychiatric adviceshould be sorted. Regards.