Ocular tuberculosis

Maitre-Jan (¹) is often credited with publishing the earliest description of ocular tuberculosis (1707). Major contributions to the understanding of the disease mechanism were not made until the latter part of the 19th century. In 1855, Eduard von Jaeger first described the ophthalmoscopic appearance of choroidal tubercles (²). Cohnheim, in 1867 (³), showed that choroidal tubercles were similar microscopically to tubercles found elsewhere in the body and postulated that ocular involvement was a metastatic manifestation of systemic infection. In addition, Cohnheim was able to produce similar lesions in guinea pigs by injecting them with tuberculous material. In 1882, Koch identified the tubercle bacillus as the causative agent (⁴), and 1 year later, Julius von Michel identified the organism in the eye (⁵).