Unilateral disc edema in idiopathic intracranial hypertension: A rare case report from India

Idiopathic intracranial hypertension (IIH) is a disorder characterized by increased intracranial pressure of unknown cause, predominantly affecting obese women of childbearing age. Papilledema or bilateral disc edema is the primary ocular finding. Unilateral swelling of the optic disc is most frequently caused by a local optic nerve or intraocular pathology like optic neuritis and ischemic optic neuropathy. Truly unilateral papilledema caused by intracranial hypertension is rare and poses a diagnostic dilemma. We report a rare case of a male patient with IIH presenting with unilateral disc edema. The unilateral presentation and male gender make the case unique. To our knowledge, this is only the second report of a strictly unilateral papilledema in IIH, in a male patient, reported from India. The other report was by Banerjee M et al . published in the European Journal of Ophthalmology in 2020.