Eye Injuries and Logging
By Brie Weisman, OTR/L, Maine AgrAbility, Winter 2022.
In logging, an eye injury can occur faster than the blink of an eye. In Maine, eye injuries rank in the top three accident-related injuries. Untreated eye injuries can go from bad to worse in very little time, potentially resulting in diminished vision or blindness.
A Mechanized logger was out walking the job site on a steep slope in the woods and turned, gouging his eye on a hemlock branch. Despite wearing safety glasses the branch managed to get behind the eye shield. He immediately experienced eye pain, blurry vision, and felt fluid running down his face. Finding that it wasn’t blood, he nevertheless drove himself directly to his optometrist. On his ride over, he began to second-guess the need to go to his eye doctor. The pain was subsiding, the blurring would surely clear up.
His optometrist cleaned out debris still lodged in his eye. He had an avulsion (tear) on his eye. For treatment, he was given an antibiotic, a contact to wear for 24 hours (as a sort of band-aid to keep the tear sealed and encourage healing), and eye drops for pain relief. His optometrist commended him for coming in right away, noting that if he had waited until the end of the day, he would have been in a tremendous amount of pain and would have likely ended up in the emergency room after normal physician’s hours. Instead, because of speedy treatment, the logger actually returned to work that same day. The next day he saw his ophthalmologist to have the contact removed. His injury was 100% healed, the eye being one of the human body’s second fastest healing organ (after the tongue).
Although his safety glasses failed to stop the branch from injuring his eye, they did offer some protection, and his optometrist is convinced that the injury would have been worse without them. Not wishing to repeat his ordeal, this logger has ordered a pair of prescription, wrap-around glasses that offer superior protection from side strikes.
Logging is fraught with eye hazards. The case above was a common enough occurrence, a logger poking himself on a static object, most commonly a branch. A second class of hazards is moving objects–falling tree limbs, snapped bungees, flying wood chips. A third is particulate matter–flying debris from grinders, or from using a compressor to blow equipment clean. Lastly, chemicals–grease, diesel, DEF, and hydraulic fluids are all caustic to the eye.
All eye injuries need to be treated seriously, even seemingly minor ones, because the outcome of ill-defined treatment is possible permanent loss of vision. Don’t attempt to treat a serious eye injury yourself. The best medical professional to see for an eye injury is either an optometrist or for more serious injuries an ophthalmologist, and the best time to see one is immediately.
Eye injury symptoms include: ongoing eye pain, trouble seeing, cut/torn eyelid, one eye not moving as well as the other, a bulging eye, unusual pupil size and shape, blood in the white of of the eye. An object on the eye that tears and blinking can’t remove should also be treated as an injury.
Below is a list of the standard eye injuries and what to do about them.
Scratched/cut eye:
Symptoms include pain, feeling like something is stuck in the eye and tearing.
Severe scratches would include blurry vision, sensitivity to light, headache.
Treatment: rinse eye with clean water using eyecup or small glass. Do blink, try pulling the upper lid over the lower lid, as lashes can help sweep debris away. After treating the eye,don’t rub or touch the eye. Don’t use contacts if you are a contact wearer and don’t use eye drops designed to relieve redness. For a severe scratch/cut, an Optmologist can provide antibiotic eye drop ointment and/or lubricating drops for comfort. DO NOT just use any eye drops,. Over the counter drops can make the injury worse.
Sand, dirt, dust in eye:
DO NOT rub eyes, instead blink several times. Eyewash, saline solution, or even tap water can be used to help flush it out. If none of these are available, lift the upper eyelid over the lashes of the lower lid to brush out particles. See an Opthamologist as soon as possible if you suspect any debris at all remains in the eye, or even if it feels like it is still in the eye. Metal, glass, and other sharp materials can be very serious, and merit an immediate trip to an ophthalmologist.
In the case of chemical burns or splash, immediately flush the eye with plenty of water, then seek medical attention at once. Gather information about the chemical that got into the eye and, if possible, call ahead with the information to the medical facility.
As with most accidental injuries, good practices and prevention dramatically reduces the number of eye injuries. Wearing appropriate protective gear at all times at work will vastly reduce the likelihood of eye injury in the first place. An impact resistant face shield or high quality, wrap around safety glasses should be considered essential for most logging jobs. A retainer that attaches to your safety glasses that will keep them in place while wearing them, or can easily be loosened so your glasses hang around your neck, convenient for use at any moment, should be considered an essential part of your eyewear. Eye protection is available in plain lenses, sunglass lenses, and prescription lenses. Make sure you get safety glasses that fit, feel good on your face, and that you like- otherwise you won’t wear them.
Wearing eye protection is an economical, easy step that is astonishingly effective at protecting sight. In the event of an eye injury, rapid treatment, both on-site, and by a medical professional, is the best way to minimize suffering, and increase the likelihood of a full and speedy recovery.