Do we need to evaluate patients with spontaneous subconjunctival haemorrhage for bleeding disorders?

Subconjunctival haemorrage (SCH) is a frequent bleeding manifestation and a common cause of visits to the primary care. Trauma in young patients and vascular damage such as hypertension in the elderly are the most common causes of SCH and the prevalence of haematological diseases is <1%. We aimed to evaluate the prevalence of congenital or acquired bleeding disorders in patients with once or recurrent SCH.

It is a retrospective study and included fifty-two patients with SCH whose aetiologic factor was not detected. Haemostatic tests were studied in 52 patients (25 male and 27 females). All patients included were evaluated for congenital or acquired bleeding disorder and SCH with once and those with two or more were compared for the laboratory results.

Type I von Willebrand disease (vWD) was diagnosed in one patient with recurrent SCH and one patient with single SCH (3.8%). The prevalence of patients with type 1 vWD in the study was not statistically significant when compared with the frequency of vWD in the normal population. Fibrinogen level was found to be statistically higher in patients who had SCH once than those who had recurrent SCH. However, fibrinogen level was in normal range in all patients.

There was no increase in the incidence of congenital or acquired bleeding disorder in SCH compared with normal population. Fort this reason, it was thought there was no need for evaluation for bleeding disorders in spontaneous SCH.