6.5 year old son sees colored spots.....what is going on?

[tiff]

My son has mentioned this maybe 10 times in the past 3 years, but says each time he sees the colored spots in the air that he sees them all the time. He has dry eye and meibomian gland disease and was thoroughly examined a few months ago. I of course forgot to mention it to the eye doctor and, considering he won't be seen again until December, I'm worried. He has very good vision, very infrequent headaches (one every few months at the most), and no other health issues. I only found two causes for these colored spots when I searched online--migraines and retinal detachment. I don't believe he has either. What could be causing this? Is it normal? Should I be concerned?

[L8rgator]

Sounds like there are more benign causes than disconcerning ones when I googled it. One neurolgist said to try putting drops in when it happens. If they go away, then it's an uncommon specific cause that isn't serious (can't find that post now, so do remember the details).

[LaDiva]

I know you are concerned, and rightfully so. I don't have an answer for you, but remember that when I was his age I reported seeing fairies. I actually think they were probably floaters. Sending you best wishes, and hoping it is just Leprechauns.

[littlemermaid]

Tiff, is he still on oral meds like erythromycin? did he have it before he took oral antibiotics? does it correlate with any activity, lying down, bending over?

At this age, I remember noticing eg black spider lines on a red background, curtain of dancing dots, occasional bright central lights on bending over. I think those were fairly normal from pressure on the optic nerves, bit of higher blood pressure. It's also the age when you experiment a bit and realise that if you stare at bright coloured dots, you can still see them in reverse colour when you look away, that type of thing.

Grey central dots or any type of patchy vision loss (transient visual obscurations) would be more of a worry, from intracranial pressures. Although again, sometimes it can be painless 'optical migraine'. Looking for papilloedema on the optic nerve head at the retina is conclusive for intracranial hypertension. I think floaters are rare in children because they are detached proteins and there isn't much reason for that to happen yet.

Are the coloured dots bright? central? all over? moving? is your son average weight and height?

Does he not reply to an email from you? He doesn't reply to mine any more Do you have anyone local to ask? What about your old Ophth or RH?

[tiff]

Hi Littlemermaid. I've been trying to reach you via the dry eye zone messages, but your box is full.

Our son is tall and a healthy weight for his age, very healthy in general. He is on no meds at all and hasn't been for a long time. He uses Blink drops twice a day, warm compresses on the weekends, and that's it.

He sees KKN in December.

I'm wondering if I should see if I can get him in sooner because his eyelid margins are sort of red lately.

The colored spots seem to come at random times as far as he's been able to articulate.