Acute Postoperative Visual Loss Due to Occipital Arteriovenous Malformation Rupture During Anesthesia

Abstract

<p>We report a case of occipital arteriovenous malformation (AVM) rupture during anaesthesia, causing postoperative visual loss in a 43-year-old man with American Society of Anesthesiologist class I. He was scheduled for an operation for the correction of right index deformity. He was a healthy, middle-sized man without any previous systemic disease. He had sustained a cutting injury to the right index finger 1 year ago and had undergone microsurgery. As he was unsatisfied with the surgical results, he was arranged for another correction surgery. After the 2-h surgery, he recovered from anaesthesia, but complained of a mild headache over the occipital region. He left the post-operative recovery room thereafter and was discharged the next day. Three days later, he came to our surgical outpatient department for follow-up. He complained of blurred vision since the surgery. The ophthalmologist found left-sided homonymous visual field loss with incomplete hemianopia. He was referred to the neurological section and after a series of examinations including brain computed tomography, the diagnosis of AVM rupture in the right occipital region was confirmed.</p> <p> </p>