Frequency and causes of bilateral occular trauma.

Objective: To determine the frequency and causes of bilateral ocular trauma.

Design: A descriptive case series.

Place And Duration Of Study: Khyber Institute of Ophthalmic Medical Sciences, Hayatabad Medical Complex, Peshawar from October 1999 to September 2006.

Patients And Methods: All patients coming to the hospital with bilateral eye trauma and requiring admission were recruited into the study. The details of patients' demographics, risk factors, ocular examination, treatment offered and final visual acuity were noted and described as frequency and percentages.

Results: Out of a total of 1551 patients of hospitalized ocular trauma, 46 (2.9%, 92 eyes) had bilateral ocular trauma. The majority (54.3%) were due to landmine blast injuries followed by dynamite blast in 10.8%, coalmine blast and firearm injury in 6.5% each. Pressure cooker explosion and road traffic accident was the cause in 4.3% each. Gas cylinder and automobile battery explosion, alkali and acid burn, assault and incidental trauma occurred in 2.1%. Sixty three percent were between 16 and 40 years of age. Males were affected in 93.4%. Corneal and / or scleral repair was done in 58.6%, conjunctival and or corneal foreign body removal in 26% and extracapular cataract extraction with intraocular lens implantation in 16.3%. The visual acuity was in the range of 6/60 and perception of light in 54.3%, while in 21.7%, there was no perception of light at the time of admission. Due to severity of injury, the final visual acuity was poor and only 28.2% regained vision between 6/18 and 6/60.

Conclusion: In this series, landmine, dynamite and coalmine blasts were the major causes of bilateral ocular trauma. Victims were usually young males. Due to severity of ocular trauma, majority had poor visual outcome.