Doctors Remove 27 Contact Lenses From A 67-year Old Woman's Eye Just Before Surgery

A 67-year-old woman was scheduled for
routine cataract surgery before doctors at
Solihull Hospital in the UK found 27
contact lenses, stuck in the woman's right
eye.



In an article published in the BMJ this
month, Rupal Morjaria, a specialist trainee
in ophthalmology and author of the paper,
said the woman hadn't complained about
any visual trouble before the operation
until Richard Crombie, a consultant
anesthetist at the hospital, was beginning
to numb her eye for surgery when he
found the first cluster of contacts.



"He put
a speculum into the eye to hold the eye
open as he put the anesthetic in, and he
noticed a blue mass under the top eyelid".




That mass was a clump of 17 lenses. The
other 10 were discovered in an additional
examination.



"We were all shocked, We've
never come across this" Morjaria said.



The woman had been wearing monthly
disposable contact lenses for 35 years.



Sometimes, she told the surgeons, when
she would try to remove a contact from
that eye, she couldn't find it.