Cortical Visual Impairment Is Not the Same As Cerebral Visual Impairment (Letter to the Editor) (Report‪)‬

The entire October 2010 issue of the Journal of Visual Impairment & Blindness (JVIB) was devoted to children and adults with visual disorders caused by brain abnormalities. JVIB and all the authors should be congratulated for their contributions. It was a pleasure for me to note the increasing interest and the progress made in this neurological condition since the early 1980s, when individuals like myself tried to convince professionals to pay attention to children who had various visual problems due to brain damage. However, I do have some concerns about a few misunderstandings that have surfaced in this issue. It should be pointed out that the term cerebral visual impairment, which was introduced by a group of European ophthalmologists, was born out of a major neurophysiological misconception. This group felt that cerebral visual impairment was a more appropriate term than cortical visual impairment (both terms were abbreviated as CVI). The reasons for this were stated in the October issue of JVIB: "Since the optic radiations are not part of the cortex, and since periventricular leucomalacia (injury to white matter of the brain-tissue containing nerve fibers) is a frequent finding in children with CVI, the anatomical designation of cerebral is a more inclusive designation" (Colenbrander, 2010, p. 583). This statement is highly problematic from the neurophysiological point of view.