The broken visual field that sometimes accompanies migraine -- what is the medical term for it?

Question:

The field of vision breaks into fragments and sometime narrows. This can accompany a migraine headache or occur alone without the headache pain. What are medical of common terms for this visual effect? Can you supply some links. Thanks.

Answers:
usually just described as a visual field cut, with some descriptors such as central. If it involves something like half the visual field, can be referred to as hemianopia, but a distinct cut in half the field, may indicate another problem, or space occupying intracranial lesion, anywhere from pituitary to the visual cortex in the occipital lobe. If there are just patterns or jagged jingly light patterns, usually referred to as scintillating scotoma (s) or scotomata (pl).

I used to have the central blindness as precursor to migraines, makes it hard to work when you can't see the page.

Other Answers:
Tunnel vision. Been there done that.

The broken visual field that usually heralds a migraine is called an aura. iVillage has an incredible section on migraines at http://health.ivillage.com/headache/migraine/topics/0,,4v80,00.html. It's really helped me reduce my number of headaches and effectively treat the ones I do get.

Good luck!

It is termed an aura.I get a metallic smell just before I get a migraine.Thank God for Imitrex.It is expensive ($350 for 7 pills,but it is worth it.My neurologist prescribes Inderal to help make the migraines occurrences less.

JRL-LPN

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The broken visual field that sometimes accompanies migraine -- what is the medical term for it?

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