A historical perspective on the early treatment of night blindness and the use of dubious and unproven treatment strategies for patients with retinitis pigmentosa

Retinitis pigmentosa (RP) is a form of inherited night blindness. Over decades, various dubious treatment strategies that lacked sufficient theoretically sound underpinnings were explored. Initially they were enthusiastically promoted and subsequently discredited. It is apparent that many were predicated on the erroneous assumption that the primary cause of RP was related to impairment of the retinal circulation. Herein, several of these strategies are reviewed and critiqued. Reasons why clinicians may have been deceived into overzealous interpretations of their treatment methods are explored. The examples disclosed should serve as a note of caution for current investigators to guard against self-deception when exploring newly developed treatment strategies.