“Doctor, I can hear my eyes”: report of two cases with different mechanisms
- 1Department of Neuro-otology, National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, London, UK
- 2Academic Department of Neuro-otology, Imperial College Faculty of Medicine, London, UK
- Correspondence to: Professor A M Bronstein Academic Department of Neuro-otology, Division of Neuroscience and Psychological Medicine, Imperial College Faculty of Medicine, Charing Cross Hospital, Fulham Palace Road, London W6 8RF, UK; a.bronsteinimperial.ac.uk
An unusual but fascinating symptom is the one described by patients complaining that they can hear their own eye movements. We report two cases, with different postulated mechanisms.
Case reports
Patient 1
A 53 year old woman presented with a tendency to fall to the left. She did not experience hearing difficulties or tinnitus. Clinical examination was unremarkable other than increased sway on Romberg. Pure tone audiometry was normal other than bilaterally mildly elevated thresholds of 30 dBHL at 8 kHz. However left sided ipsi- and contra-lateral stapedial reflexes were elevated, and auditory brain-stem evoked responses, while normal on the right, showed increased latency of wave V on the left. Serial MRI scans demonstrated an enlarging left vestibular schwannoma. Trans-labyrinthine resection of the tumour was complicated by a left cerebellar infarct and hydrocephalus, and subsequently the patient continued to experience imbalance. Two years post-operatively, …
