Ask a doctor on the topic of General medicine

I see red spots or veins when I open my eyes.

January 18, 2016 | 30,00 EUR | answered by Dr. med. Frauke Gehring

Hello dear medical team, let me introduce myself briefly: I am a 46-year-old woman, a smoker for 30 years (had a preventive smoking CT scan last year, everything was fine), I am 1.68 cm tall and weigh 70 kg. I don't do much exercise, I jog about twice a week for 30 minutes.

Almost a year ago, during a routine examination, high blood pressure (very high 220/110) was detected, which was lowered to 120/80 or 130/80 by immediately taking Ramilich 10 mg and Amlodipine 5 mg. So for about a year now, my blood pressure has been in the normal range. I bought a blood pressure monitor and check the values at least 3 times a week, which are in the normal range both during the day and at night.

Now I come to my actual problem:

For about half a year now, I have noticed that when I wake up at night and only half-open my eyes, a large red dot appears in front of my eyes for about 1 second, which immediately disappears when I fully open my eyes. When I cover one eye, the dot appears on both the right and left side, so it is not limited to one eye.

In my room, it is not completely dark, there is a very slight dim light.

When I wake up early in the morning and slightly open my eyes, I briefly see "veins/blood vessels" as you would see them during a retinal examination with the examination glass at the ophthalmologist.

I went to the eye doctor about 5 months ago. Apart from farsightedness, nothing was found in my eyes. The preventive examination for glaucoma was also done. The eye doctor said that the dots/veins might possibly be due to high blood pressure. The eyes themselves are without any findings.

I measure my blood pressure at night, after this very strong red dot appears when I wake up, and it is always between 120 or 130/80.

It's strange that the dot or veins are only visible for about 1 second with half-open eyes, never when I am awake and my eyes are fully open. Even if I only half-open my eyes during the day, neither the dot nor the veins appear. Only at night, when I wake up and open my eyes or right before getting up.

Do you have any idea what this could be? I can hardly sleep properly anymore because every time I wake up at night, I am surprised by this huge dot that really scares me.

Best regards

Dr. med. Frauke Gehring

Good day,

Since the points are obviously not due to a retinal disorder and your eyes are healthy, it is a kind of "visual hallucination". This means that your optic nerve is conveying impressions that do not correspond to reality. It doesn't mean anything if you are otherwise symptom-free. Your nervous system is simply providing "memory images". Your blood pressure has nothing to do with this, as it is well controlled.

Perhaps a neurological examination should be done.

By the way, "preventive CT scans" should be rejected! They involve high levels of radiation and only provide security for up to three months! But that has nothing to do with your symptoms.

Best regards, Dr. Höllering