Watch your eyes when playing games

Holidays are around the corner and much as you cannot prevent your kids from playing games, it is important to ensure that it is done in a safe way. An enjoyable game could turn into an unfortunate incident because of an eye injury, reports Sade Oguntola.

Femi was playing with his friend at school. In the course of doing this, a paper ball hit him in the eyes and this turned red. So what started out as an enjoyable game eventually turned into an unfortunate incident that made him secure an eye injury that his mother had to take him to see an eye doctor.

But Wunmi was not lucky in her case after she mistakenly inserted a broomstick into her left eye when doing a role-play of a mother with her friends during the holidays. Unfortunately, after treatment, Wunmi’s vision was not without some lingering effects from the injury.

Holidays are around the corner and both the young and the old often look forward to soccer games on the open school field. Some girls too get carried away with their games. Whether it is the energy exerting football match or even the basketball game, this exposes people to sports-related eye injuries. It is always fun for the player until such gets a serious injury, which could be on any part of the body, including the eyes.

However, the injuries that can occur with sports or children playing in a rough way can certainly be very significant without the person injured even realizing early how significant the injury really is.

The possibility of people involved in sports or children playing at school sustaining eye injury, according to Dr. Gboyega Ajayi, a consultant ophthalmologist at Ojulowo Eye Clinic, Ibadan, calls for people to be more careful. He said sports-related injuries could be a reason for blindness, especially when such an eye injury is not adequately treated.

He said injury to the eyes is not taken serious in less-developed nations like Nigeria, especially in children, adding that in most cases even the children do not alert their parents when they sustain any injury during an unsupervised sport or in the course of playing with their mates.

“A lot of times, children in course of playing do all sorts like throwing paper missiles, catapults, push themselves just any how as well as play with objects like pencils and broom sticks with sharp ends. Usually when they sustain the injury their parents will not know until a day or two after,” he stated.

Dr. Ajayi said the greatest problem is their delay in seeking proper treatment, stressing that from a study done some years back, if an injury causes external bleeding, the parents are more likely to come to the hospital to see that the injury is treated unlike where there is no bleeding. He said for most parents the so-called injuries they call minor end up having more severe complications than the ones they perceive as major, emphasizing that parents should not see themselves as competent enough to judge which eye injury is severe or not. Such injuries need to be properly assessed by the ophthalmologist.

Dr. Ajayi said currently, clashes among the supporters of the two clubs after their favourite teams play a football match has left a number of fans sustaining some injuries sporting injuries.

“There was this 20-year-old man who had received a blow on the face. The eye was swollen, hard and red. Blood filled the inner chambers of the eye and he could not see. He was lucky as he was taken to the theatre and surgery done to remove the blood clot. Because he came very early his vision was fully restored after a while.

“Cases of slaps on the face like that from one fan to the other that left the right eye swollen and the inner contents of the eye protruding out of the eye and with much pain and inability to see well that the individual now goes on to merely self-medicate did not turn out the expected way. She later showed up in the eye clinic after 10 days to seek for help. But by then, the eye had developed some complications.

Dr. Shahzad Mian, a cornea and cataract surgeon with the U-M Health System’s Kellogg Eye Centre, also called for caution when playing games because injuries that can occur with sports-related trauma can certainly be very significant, and the person who is injured may not realise early how significant the injury really is.

He said even when it is merely a bruise around the eye, a bleed inside the eye or damage to the lens in the eye, it is very important to seek medical advice, especially from an ophthalmologist.

He said when there are flashes or floaters, pain around the eye, or a bruise around the eye, it may indicate a bleeding inside the eye, retinal detachment or damage to the lens.

It is important to have these facts about sports-related eye injuries at the back of your mind:

• More than 40,000 people a year suffer eye injuries while playing sports, according to Prevent Blindness America.

•Experts recommend wearing safety goggles for such games as basketball and racquet sports and helmets with face shields for youth baseball and hockey.

•Corneal abrasions – scratches on the outer layer of the cornea – often occur in sports when a player gets poked in the eye or hit in the eye with a ball. Symptoms may include redness, tearing, sensitivity to light and blurry vision.

•Parents should call a doctor immediately if their child suffers any injury to the eye itself, if the skin is split open and may need stitches, or if vision is blurred in either eye.