occipital lobe signs
Last reviewed 07/2021
The most common presentation of an occipital lobe lesion is of a visual field defect:
- cortical blindness
- Anton's syndrome
- prosopagnosia
- visual agnosia
- homonymous hemianopia with or without involvement of the macula depending upon the posterior extent of the lesion; a central hemianopic field defect involving the macula only with a normal peripheral field arises when only the occipital pole is involved
- visual hallucinations may accompany migraine and epilepsy - these are elementary, appearing as patterns such as zig-zags and flashes and filling the hemianopic field; in comparison, temporal lobe visual hallucinations are formed, complex, and fill the entire visual field.
- visual illusions - micropsia - objects appear smaller - and macropsia - objects appear larger