Congenital stationary night blindness with myopia: a clinico-pathologic study

The left eye of a 77 year old male patient was enucleated because of absolute glaucoma. This eye showed subnormal electroretinogram (ERG) and oscillatory potentials preoperatively, but the other eye showed Schubert-Bornschein type ERG and monophasic dark adaptation curve. Light and electron microscopic studies of the left eye showed a normal arrangement of discs of rod outer segments, normal synaptic ends of the photoreceptors, and complete loss of ganglion cells. From the subnormal ERG in the left eye we assumed it was originally Schubert-Bornschein type ERG but inverted to subnormal type ERG following the loss of inhibitory mechanisms. Thus we propose that the cause of night blindness in congenital stationary cases with Schubert-Bornschein type ERG may be related to the mechanisms inhibitory to cells of the bipolar layer.