Hi guys,
I hope we are all doing amazing and having a wonderful time. It is been quite a while since I had the opportunity to share and it's because I was moving to a new location to start work at a new facility. The process was a bit tedious and time-consuming however I thank God all is sorted now.
So yea, I am back again and as you may already be aware, I am all about health care, well, ocular health care to be exact, and just as I normally do it, today I would be introducing us to a condition known as Uveitis and we would tackle this from the perspective of trauma and inflammation. I do hope that you enjoy the read.
Traumatic Uveitis
I have met lots of patients who waited to see a decline in vision, their eyes becoming red for about a week or more and their pain increasing to an unbearable point before they finally decided to get a consult with the Optometrist and this was after they had a trauma to the eye.
When I asked them why they waited, most of them said, "Oh, I thought it would just go away after a while", whereas others also said, "I took some pain killers so I was thinking it was nothing serious and it would go away". Then I'd normally be like, "If you were involved in an accident, wouldn't you go for a checkup to be sure all is well, just so you avoid internal bleeding of any kind?"
And their answer is always yes, so then I ask, why not with the eye? What happened to you, is it not a form of accident? So, guys, the eye behaves a lot like most of our other systems although it has its own specialties however we ought to treat any trauma to the eye as an ocular emergency whether there was penetration or it was just a blunt trauma. Never assumed everything will be fine.
What normally happens is that sometimes there is a delayed response to inflammation, and so within the early hours or even days you may not notice much of a change, perhaps some mild pains until things set in, and then it can escalate very quickly. Uveitis is an inflammatory condition where the uvea layer within your eye gets inflamed, and this can happen due to the delayed response to trauma.
Uveitis is not necessarily a sight-menacing condition however when left untreated one could lose their vision to it. The inflammation causes your vitreous to become hazy and could cause your iris to get attached to your lens within the eye or even your cornea, either of which is bad. The good thing about uveitis is that is very much treatable and in the case of trauma, all of this could easily be avoided if you get a consult with your Optometrist after the trauma.
You would always be given prophylaxis against uveitis including eye drops to prevent synechiae so you do not end up having your iris attach itself to your lens or your cornea.
Conclusion
So that's what I have for you today, do not wait for something to happen after you have experienced trauma to the eye before you seek ocular care. Even if the trauma was a blunt one, get yourself checked, it is better safe than sorry.
@nattybongoIt was a pleasure serving you today, we are almost at the end of the month and as we anticipate the coming days and months, I wish you the very best, stay safe and stay healthy, and avoid over the counter drug's without proper care and best of luck to all of us. Ciao
Further Reading
Talley D. K. (1993). Traumatic anterior uveitis. Optometry clinics: the official publication of the Prentice Society, 3(2), 21–26..
Hom, J., Sarwar, S., Kaleem, M. A., Messina, C. R., Abariga, S. A., & Nguyen, Q. D. (2020). Topical mydriatics as adjunctive therapy for traumatic iridocyclitis. The Cochrane database of systematic reviews, 8(8), CD013260. https://doi.org/10.1002/14651858.CD013260.pub2.
Pinch C. M. (2019). Evaluation of Traumatic Uveitis in the Emergency Department. Advanced emergency nursing journal, 41(2), 122–128. https://doi.org/10.1097/TME.0000000000000243.
Papakostas, T. D., Yonekawa, Y., Skondra, D., & Vavvas, D. G. (2013). Traumatic chorioretinal rupture (sclopetaria). International ophthalmology clinics, 53(4), 119–125. https://doi.org/10.1097/IIO.0b013e3182a26f18.