Eye Emergencies in Pittsburgh

Eye emergencies are anything that may cause permanent damage to your eyes or vision without timely intervention from an eye care professional.

The most common types of eye emergencies include:

• A blow, poke or other trauma to the eye
• Sudden loss of vision in one or both eyes
• Chemical spills in the eye
• Foreign object embedded in the eye
• Sudden appearance of light flashes or floaters
• Contact lens lost in the eye

Symptoms of an eye infection typically include itching, burning, redness, crusty and watery eyes. See a Pittsburgh eye doctor if your symptoms last over 4 days or if you experience intense pain, redness, blurred vision or light sensitivity.

Most of the time, a person can easily remove debris from the eye by repeatedly blinking to get the debris out. If that doesn't work, you can wash your eye with saline (sterile salt water) to flush out any dust and dirt from your eye, or use streaming tap water.

However, to scratch your cornea while attempting to get an object out which can cause further site-threatening complications.

So the best thing you can do in this kind of eye emergency is to get to your eye doctor in Pittsburgh as soon as possible.