The Crystalline Lens in Chronic Surgical Hypoparathyroidism

Abstract

Slit-lamp examination of the lens was carried out in 32 hypoparathyroid patients and in 25 thyroidectomized normocalcemic control patients. There was a high prevalence of lenticular opacities in both groups. Opacities sufficiently severe to be visible on clinical examination were present in half the hypoparathyroid patients and in two subjects of the control group. In eight of the hypoparathyroid patients, the lens changes consisted of one or more discrete layers of opacity in the peripheral cortex; this appearance, regarded as a typical lesion of hypoparathyroidism, was also seen in one control patient. The prevalence of typical lens changes and of cataracts requiring surgery increased with the duration of hypocalcemia.