Clinical studies of Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada's disease at the National Eye Institute, NIH, USA.

We have, in the recent past, seen 46 Vogt-Koyanagi-Harada's disease patients at the National Eye Institute. Most of these patients have been women, and a high percentage were Black-American or Hispanic. However, an interesting observation has been American Indian antecedents for a large number of these patients, whether they considered themselves Black or Caucasian. The visual acuities tended to be at the extremes of the vision chart. Patients with this disorder appear to have circulating autoantibodies to the retinal photoreceptor region, and these autoantibodies do not appear to be directed against the retinal S-antigen.