I've been worried these past couple of days because I noticed that Mika had white/hazy spots on her eyes. I'd noticed a tiny dot on her left eye a couple of weeks ago, but since it was only on that one eye I'd assumed it was a scratch. But over the weeks, that tiny dot got bigger, until it turned into this (taken two days ago):
Brought her to the vet today. The first thing she did was shining lights into her eyes to see where exactly the spots were located. Thankfully, the spots were on the cornea and not in the lenses, which would indicate something more serious (such as cataracts). PHEW!!
She then did two tests; first something called a "schirmer tear test," where she stuck a thin strip of paper into each of Mika's eyes and waited for tears to be produced; the tears were supposed to turn the paper blue, which they did. The second test was the fluorescence eye stain, where she put green dye into Mika's eyes and then shone lights on them to make sure that the dye didn't pool anywhere where the spots where (which would indicate holes, or ulcers). Mika passed that test with flying colours too.
So finally, the vet concluded that Mika either has corneal degeneration or corneal dystrophy. The difference between these two conditions is that corneal dystrophy is hereditary, while corneal degeneration is not. To my understanding, both diseases involve cholesterol or calcium deposits on the cornea of the eye. These usually do not impair the sight and so do not require treatment. Woohoo!!
But Mika had her blood panel done a few months ago, and her cholesterol and calcium levels were perfect, which is odd, considering that both of the conditions involve calcium or cholesterol deposits; so the vet referred us to an ophthalmologist for a second opinion.
Mika still had some green tears coming from her left eye when we got home, thanks to the tests! I still think she has the most beautiful eyes in the world, regardless of whether there are spots on them. (And the spot is hard to see in this photo anyway because of the reflection in her eye.)
Note the green tears:
On another note, I was very happy that Mika seemed more relaxed at this appointment and didn't refuse a single treat!
