Functional visual loss

Patients with functional loss of visual acuity or visual fields range from the "deliberate malingerer" to the "suggestible innocent." Between these extremes are patients with varying mixtures of fraud and suggestibility. These patients do not, as a rule, have psychiatric disease and do not need to see a psychiatrist. The ophthalmologist must be able to control frustration with these patients to prove that the patient has better visual fields and visual acuity than admitted to, and so that he can perform a careful, dispassionate examination to establish that no organic disease is present. This examination makes it possible to offer believable reassurance to the patient. Simple reassurance seems to be effective therapy.