The authors studied 33 patients with central serous chorioretinopathy and found that a very disturbing psychological event had preceded the loss of vision in 91% of the cases. The acute disturbance preceded the first visual symptoms by an average of 7 days. When relapses occurred, the psychological disturbances were often less severe and preceded the visual symptoms by minutes or hours. In some cases vision improved 1 to 2 weeks after the patient learned of the amelioration of the original distressing situation. The majority of the patients were found to be tension ridden, and 48% had cardiovascular abnormalities.