Case Study 73 Intrascleral Foreign Body

Abstract

AA is a 27-year-old man who was hammering metal without safety glasses and felt a sharp pain in his right eye. His vision was somewhat blurred, but he decided to see if it would improve by the next day. However, he awoke in the morning with worsening of his vision, so he decided to seek medical attention and went to an emergency room. An intraocular foreign body was suspected based on the history and a CT of the globe was ordered. It was unclear whether the particle was intraocular or external to the globe so an ultrasound was ordered. The scan showed that the piece of metal was in the outer sclera (Fig. 1), so it was elected to treat the patient conservatively with topical antibiotics and steroids along with systemic antibiotics. The eye became more quiet and the vision returned to normal over 3 weeks. The metal was determined to be stainless steel and the risk of intraocular toxicity was felt to be minimal, so the plan was to follow the patient with periodic electroretinograms (ergs).

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AA is a 27-year-old man who was hammering metal without safety glasses and felt a sharp pain in his right eye. His vision was somewhat blurred, but he decided to see if it would improve by the next day. However, he awoke in the morning with worsening of his vision, so he decided to seek medical attention and went to an emergency room. An intraocular foreign body was suspected based on the history and a CT of the globe was ordered. It was unclear whether the particle was intraocular or external to the globe so an ultrasound was ordered. The scan showed that the piece of metal was in the outer sclera (Fig. 1), so it was elected to treat the patient conservatively with topical antibiotics and steroids along with systemic antibiotics. The eye became more quiet and the vision returned to normal over 3 weeks. The metal was determined to be stainless steel and the risk of intraocular toxicity was felt to be minimal, so the plan was to follow the patient with periodic electroretinograms (ergs).

Fig. 1

B-scan of intrascleral foreign body (arrow)

Occasionally other types of foreign material can become trapped within intraocular tissue.