A 55-year-old Philadelphia resident narrowly escaped permanent blindness after a bee sting lodged in his eye, necessitating a forceful removal with tweezers.
The man sought urgent medical attention as his vision deteriorated and pain intensified. Despite the swift identification of the stinger, doctors were unable to completely extract it as it was deeply embedded in the edge of his iris, the colored part of the eye.
According to the Daily Mail, the man, still in excruciating pain and virtually blind in his right eye, sought help from the Wills Eye Hospital in Philadelphia two days later. Upon further examination, doctors discovered dangerous internal bleeding within the eye and damage to the minuscule blood vessels. This was detected through a detailed eye exam using a slit-lamp and fluorescein dye, which highlighted the damage by turning it a yellow-green color.
The patient exhibited redness in the white part of the eye, a condition known as conjunctival injection. He also had severe swelling in the lower part of the cornea, the transparent, dome-shaped front part of the eye that covers the iris, pupil, and anterior chamber. A portion of the stinger remained lodged in the side of the eye closest to the nose, appearing yellow after the dye application. There was also internal bleeding in the eye, likely due to the stinger damaging the iris and causing the iris vessels to bleed.
Despite their minuscule size, stingers can cause significant damage. They range from 1.5 to 3 mm in size, roughly one-sixteenth to one-eighth of an inch. Stingers are barbed, enabling them to saw through tissue and lodge themselves in the eye. When a stinger becomes embedded in a person's skin, or in this case, the eye, it is usually removed from the bee's body, causing the bee's death.
The venom contained in bee, wasp, and yellow jacket stings can cause significant damage to the cornea, iris, and retina, potentially leading to blindness. This damage can also result in scarring, another potential cause of vision loss. To treat the man's inflammation, doctors prescribed antibiotic eye drops and drops containing prednisolone, a corticosteroid. They reported, "At 5 months of follow-up, the visual acuity in the right eye had improved to 20/25." Bee stings in the eye are rare, and few case studies describe such incidents.
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