If you wear contact lense , here ’s a cautionary tale not to wash away them in water tap water , unless you want a painful cornea - eating amoeba .
Andrew Carthew , a paramedic from Cornwall in southerly England , had to have his oculus removed after his contact lens were infected by a parasitic amoeba .
The 59 - twelvemonth - old humanity ’s eye contagion was caused byAcanthamoeba keratitis – a disease where an amoeba set on the middle ’s cornea , leading to difficultness seeing or blindness .
The ameba is discover in most sample of grunge and bodies of piss , although it is trust his eye came into link with it after he wash away his impinging lenses with water faucet water . The amoeba was then trapped between his center and the lens , where it come to infect the cornea . Here , it can infiltrate the corneal heart and do uttermost pain .
Carthew ’s ordeal started when he wake up with a weepy eye in June 2015 . He headed to the hospital and was diagnosed with a distinctive eye contagion . However , after a few twenty-four hours of sleep at home and some medication , his shape failed to improve .
By the time he was eventually diagnose withAcanthamoeba keratitisa few weeks later , the infection of his cornea had aggravate .
“ The pain sensation is absolutely shocking with it . I can only discover it like a odontalgia radiating from the eye but it pretend all that side of your human face , ” Carthew state , according to theMail Online . “There was about six to eight calendar week were all I did was lay in a darkened room with shades on and the only meter I ever went out was to go to hospital . You would n’t think that an eye contagion could be so debilitating , ” he added .
Eventually , the transmission became so severe that doctors had no option other than to remove his eye through surgery . Although the disease force him to retire before than planned , he is now recovering well and hop to raise knowingness of this comparatively strange infection .
It ’s clear that this particular berth could have been avoided if the impinging lenses were the right way cleaned with sterile link lens solution . However , flabby link lens users should always be untrusting of centre contagion . Acanthamoeba keratitisalone affect one in 25,000 contact lens wearers per year in the UK , according toMoorfields Eye Hospital London . You’re particularly at risk if you swim , shower , or bathe while wearing your lenses .
You remain firm a full probability of avoiding this infection if you apply the contact crystalline lens with clean hands , utilize the appropriate lens cleaning solutions , and never use tap water system to clean house them .
