This report for the Belgian Ophthalmological Society concerns a number
of fundus diseases, which most ophthalmologists only rarely encounter.
Still it is of importance that they should be able to recognize them,
not only because most of these eye diseases are treatable when they are
diagnosed early enough, but also because they are sometimes associated
with major visceral and neurological problems. The ophthalmologist may
be the first practitioner to suspect a von Hippel-Lindau's disease or a
neurofibromatosis. He should realize at that moment that his role is not
only to treat the eyes but also to advise his patient, refer him to
other specialists and consider the genetical implications of his
diagnosis. Clinicopathologic correlations are of great importance and we
felt that it was necessary to emphasize the histopathological aspect of
these diseases. A report has to overview the literature on a specific
topic. The literature on vascular tumors of the fundus is extremely vast
and even if we tried to be as complete as possible, we must confess that
we did not cite every author who published on such cases. A third
aspect, which was considered as important, was to provide sufficient
clinical and histopathologic examples of the various disease, which are
reviewed. We are indebted to a large number of friends who kindly
authorized the publication of their material. In particular we wish
thank Prof. A. Brini (Strasbourg), Dr. D. de Wolff-Rouendaal (Leiden),
Prof. P.