Barmaid's eyeball explodes twice
A young Welsh woman is hoping surgeons can save her sight after her left eyeball "exploded", according to the Daily Mail in London.
Liz Hodgkinson, 28, suffered a split cornea which caused her optical fluid to dribble out of her eye. The first time was during a driving lesson two years ago.
"I knew I had a condition called keratoconus (a bulging of the cornea) because my mother had it and my brother has it," the barmaid and artist said. "But what I had, where the cornea split, is called hydrops. My case was so extreme that it has been written about in a medical journal."
The surgical procedure will see the transplant of some human cornea in the hope it will prevent the thin tissue from breaking open and blinding her.
"It first happened when I was on a driving lesson in 2010. I felt a very sharp pain in my eye," she said. "I wasn't sure if something had got in like a piece of grit, or if it was a very severe allergic reaction.
"Fluid started running down my face. I thought it was my eyes watering, but it turned out it was the optical fluid in the eyeball. I couldn't lift my eyelid. It was impossible.
"I had no idea what it was at all. We were told to go immediately to A&E. The pain was dreadful.
"I was given anaesthetic eye drops, but there wasn't a great deal the staff could do for me.
"The consultant decided to apply an optical bandage, which wrapped around a lot of my eyeball to protect it and to stop any more fluid weeping out, as my eyeball was basically deflating."
According to the Daily Mail report, Ms Hodgkinson's iris had moved to block the gap and was bulging from the front of her eye. There were fears her optic nerve would be dangerously exposed.
She was put on a high-altitude drug to equalise the pressure in her eyeball, the Mail reports.
Ms Hodgkinson will have surgery in a fortnight.
