Clinical manifestations of parasellar mass

Purpose This study was purposed to make comparative analysis on various clinical findings of parasellar mass which was diagnosed by ophthalmologist. Methods For 51 patients diagnosed as parasellar mass (23 males, 28 females), we reviewed vision, clinical symptoms, visual fields, imaging study. Results At the first visit, the patient's most common chief complain was decreased visual acuity or blurred vision (41 patients) and other symptoms include visual field defect (7 patients) and diplopia (3 patients). Corrected visual acuity was varied from 1.0 to <0.01. Variable visual field defect pattern was noted (normal to complete defect). But usually bilateral temporal hemianopia was the most common finding in visual field test. In some cases, diplopia was the only symptom of mass. Conclusions When a patient complains visual field defects and shows unilateral or bilateral temporal visual field defect in visual field test, it was easy to suspect parasellar mass. But no visual field defect in patient with tumor is also exist. So in patients who complain unexplained visual discomfort with normal visual acuity or normal visual filed, we must suspect tumor and consider neurologic image study in order to rule out the tumor.