Morning glory syndrome and autism: A case report

Abstract

Autism is a developmental neuropsychiatric disorder that starts in early years of life, lasts lifelong, and characterized by the triad of impaired social skills, delayed speech, and repetitive or unusual behaviours. Morning glory syndrome (MGS) is a congenital anomaly of the optic disc, first described in 1970 and named by Kindler due to a resemblance to the flower of the same name. Congenital anomalies are more common in autistics compared to normal population. Among all types of congenital anomalies, the frequency of autism is higher with brain and/or eye anomalies. In this paper, we reported a 2-year-old female, who was diagnosed to have morning glory syndrome when she was 14-months old and admitted to our clinic because of delayed speech and lack of communication. Although congenital eye anomalies and autism comorbidity is high, there is only one case diagnosed to have MGS with autism reported in the literature. We aimed to report this case because of the difference in visual impairment than previous case and to impress on the relationship between MGS and autism, which stems from the early development phase of embryological life, when there is increased sensitivity for genetic and environmental factors.