The application of visually evoked cerebral potentials in ophthalmological diagnosis

A short survey is presented of what can be done with electrophysiological techniques in ophthalmological diagnosis. It is stressed that more investigation has to be done to elucidate the discrepancies between electrophysiological and psychophysical disturbances. These discrepancies can be used for the differential diagnosis. More, though still too little, is known about differences between a disturbance of latency time and that of amplitude. It seems that latencies are more disturbed in active pathological processes like demyelination, compression of nerve fibres and oedema, whereas isolated reduction of amplitudes occurs in optic atrophies. Some optic nerve diseases are found to be combined with ERG abnormalities, such as tobacco-alcohol neuropathy and some hereditary diseases.