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Blindness following a diabetic foot infection: a variant to the ‘eye–foot syndrome’?
Author(s) -
Yuen K. C. J.,
Baker N. R.,
Reddy A.,
Edelsten C.,
Rayman G.
Publication year - 2000
Publication title -
diabetic medicine
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.474
H-Index - 145
eISSN - 1464-5491
pISSN - 0742-3071
DOI - 10.1046/j.1464-5491.2000.00332.x
Subject(s) - medicine , diabetic retinopathy , diabetic foot , diabetes mellitus , endophthalmitis , foot (prosody) , retinopathy , surgery , blindness , eye disease , complication , peripheral neuropathy , vascular disease , optometry , endocrinology , linguistics , philosophy
SUMMARYAims The ‘eye–foot syndrome’ was initially described by Walsh et al . to highlight the important association of foot lesions in patients with diabetic retinopathy. We present a case of a 58‐year‐old patient with Type 2 diabetes mellitus who developed blindness following endogenous staphylococcal endophthalmitis from an infected foot ulcer. Results Our case describes the link between the eye and the foot but is somewhat different to the association as described by Walsh et al . Endogenous endophthalmitis is rare with diabetic patients being especially at risk, and we report the first case of endogenous staphylococcal endophthalmitis related to a diabetic foot lesion. Conclusions Our case illustrates several important issues in the management of diabetic patients admitted to hospital with infection; the need to thoroughly examine the feet to ascertain any foot lesions and any underlying peripheral vascular disease or peripheral neuropathy, to treat aggressively any infected foot lesions to prevent serious complications of septicaemia and to consider rare conditions like endogenous endophthalmitis in any diabetic patient presenting with acute visual impairment and septicaemia.