Doctor pulls out a clump of 23 contact lenses from patient’s eye: ‘Never seen anything like it’

Approximately, more than 4 billion adults around the world wear prescription glasses which brings the population to about 64%. Some might switch to other vision-enhancing products like contact lenses. Although easy enough to use, these can be a little bit tricky to wear. A recently shared story by an ophthalmologist deemed this statement true when she posted this eye-opening video on social media.

Pain in the eye

The video posted on Instagram has been making rounds on the internet and has accumulated over a million views. It was recorded by Dr Katerina Kurteeva’s assistant in their clinic in California. According to Insider, the patient was an old woman in her mid-70s who complained about the pain in her eye and felt ‘something bad in her eye’

The woman wore contact lenses regularly and had been suggested to show up for regular checkups like other senior patients, however, she had missed several appointments. The patient also revealed that her vision was blurry and her eyes were visibly irritated, which could be due to several reasons.

23 contact lenses removed

The doctor suspected that this might be due to the patient’s contact lenses. As the doctor was examining the patient, she noticed the edges of contact lenses peaking from behind the woman’s eye. The lenses were clumped together and were stuck at the back of the woman’s eye. Dr Katerina used a cotton swab and began pulling them out gently:

Pulling them out, I felt like I could still see more and asked my assistant to get my phone to record the removal.

The doctor asked the woman to look down again and saw a large clumped bunch of contact lenses stuck together. She started removing them gently and extracted 23 contact lenses in total. The patient felt better almost immediately after the removal, although she was left stunned after the realization of her procedure.

Fortunately, she had no long-lasting effects and went home with aftercare medicine. The doctor, however, informed her that the contact lenses might have accumulated over the past years in the patient's eye. It could be very dangerous to leave disposable contact lenses in your eye for more than 24 hours.

Sources use:

-Insider: I recently removed 23 contact lenses from a patient's eye. In my 20 years as a doctor, I've never seen anything like it.

-Reference: How Many People in the World Wear Glasses?