By Valerie Auslender

Written on
24/12/2020, Updated

12/23/2020 at 10:37 AM

All the more dangerous as they are small

You’ve probably had the experience of narrowly avoiding a cork of champagne in your head. Fortunately, our head dodge reflex movement usually allows us to avoid this projectile and spare the eye.

The other defense systems that are the eyelids which surround the eyeball, the blink reflex and the orbital relief are often insufficient to protect the eye against a cork which is propelled at high speed. Blunt objects are all the more dangerous as they are small, and can directly reach the eyeball.

If this occurs, the most common symptoms are eye pain, a red, swollen eye, and decreased visual acuity of varying intensity. The impact of a champagne cork thrown at high speed can cause eye contusion. Severe, it can be a real ophthalmological emergency.

All eye structures can be damaged

The impact of the plug can shake all the layers of the eye, from front to back until sometimes reaching the posterior pole of the eye responsible for a hemorrhage of the macula or a rupture of the choroid.

The ocular structures are successively damaged in the event of projection of the foreign body with potentially from front to back the following lesions:

• corneal damage with slight erosion, or even corneal edema with decreased visual acuity;
• conjunctival hemorrhage;
• an effusion of blood in the anterior chamber;
• a tearing of the base of the iris;
• dislocation of the lens, sometimes even cataracts;
• retinal hemorrhage;
• retinal detachment.

In cases of violent trauma, the contusion can be associated with a puncture wound.

So if you don’t want to spend your New Years Eve in the Emergency Room, be vigilant!

SEE AS ​​WELL