EyeRounds Online Atlas of Ophthalmology

Contributor: William Charles Caccamise, Sr, MD, Retired Clinical Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology, University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry

*Dr. Caccamise has very generously shared his images of patients taken while operating during the "eye season" in rural India as well as those from his private practice during the 1960's and 1970's. Many of his images are significant for their historical perspective and for techniques and conditions seen in settings in undeveloped areas.

Category: Cataract

Nuclear cataract, incipient stage

The photo was computer manipulated in order to make this incipient nuclear cataract visible on careful observation.The nuclear cataract per se can never - technically - become a mature cataract. To be mature all of the lens including the cortex must be cataractous. The advanced nuclear cataract was one of the types frequently operated on at the Eye Clinic. The stages of a nuclear cataract are: 1. nuclear sclerosis, 2. incipient nuclear cataract (at this stage, Dr. Caccamise used the criterion of a circular reflex elicited with the direct ophthalmoscope with the pupil fully dilated. That reflex determined for him that nuclear sclerosis had advanced to nuclear cataract.), 3. well-established nuclear cataract with a definite increase in density, 4. cataracta brunescens, and finally 5. the ominous cataracta nigra.

Ophthalmic Atlas Images by EyeRounds.org, The University of Iowa are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.