Verteporfin photodynamic therapy of retinal capillary hemangioblastoma in von Hippel-Lindau disease

Abstract

An 18-year-old boy presented to us with bilateral retinal hemangioblastoma and von Hippel-Lindau disease with history of cerebral capillary hemangioblastoma and embryonic cell carcinoma of left testes. The vision in the right eye was already lost with development of secondary closed angle glaucoma, optic atrophy with subsequent development of bullous keratopathy. The multiple retinal angiomatous lesions in the seeing left eye were treated with various modalities like triple freeze thaw cryopexy, focal lasers and transpupillary thermo therapy in multiple sittings over a period of almost 20 years since detection. One particular angiomatous lesion in the left eye was showing resistance to all the above mentioned modalities and was finally successfully treated with verteporfin and photodynamic therapy to achieve complete regression without any post-treatment complication and with a sustained 20/20 vision till a follow-up of 15 months.