Doctor removes 23 contact lenses from patient’s eye
A doctor in Los Angeles, California had to remove 23 contact lenses from a patient’s right eye after she forgot to remove them every night and put on a new one every morning.
Dr Kurteeva reported that the patient was in her mid-70s and entered the clinic claiming that she had something stuck in her eye that she could not remove.
The patient had reportedly skipped her clinic appointments for two years, despite the doctor’s clear instructions that senior citizens should seek checkups at least once per year.
The woman was reported to have blurry vision, but it was the pain in her eyes that bothered her the most.
Dr Kurteeva said she decided to inspect the patient’s right eye for the possibility of a broken contact lens, a scratch on the cornea, an infection, and eyelash or makeup debris.
The doctor reportedly applied an anaesthetic and a yellow stain to reveal if there were any scratches or foreign bodies lodged in the eye. She then proceeded to manually pull on the lower and upper lids to see if there was anything in the deep corners of the eyes, also known as the upper or lower fornix. This is where objects occasionally get stuck.
Using an eyelid speculum to keep the eye open, Dr Kurteeva said she asked the patient to look down and that is when she noticed the edges of several contact lenses stuck to each other.
She then reported that a huge, dark-purple blob of contact lenses was stuck to the patient’s eye, which could be described as a second pupil.
A Q-tip was then used to peel the lenses apart one by one as they were coming out in a chain, drooping down her lid. Twenty-three contact lenses were counted in total.
The patient was in disbelief regarding the number of contact lenses that were taken from her eye. The patient eye was immediately flushed with distilled, sterile water, some of the mucus removed, and sent home with anti-inflammatory drops.
The patient reported that she felt better instantly.