Diabetic retimopathy in Cushing's disease.

Introduction Most cases of Cushing's syndrome are known to have abnormalities of carbohydrate metabolism (Plotz, Knowlton and Ragan, 1952; Thorn, Renold and Cahill, 1959) and between 10-25% of patients have clinical diabetes mellitus (Thorn et al., 1959). However, the vascular complications of diabetes are reported to be uncommon (Thorn et al., 1959). In the past, adrenalectomy was tried for relieving diabetic retinopathy, but although a few cases had some regression (Malins, 1962; Graef and Maier, 1962) poor results led to abandonment of the procedure. The authors now report what they believe is the first case of proliferative diabetic retinopathy in Cushing's disease.