NONMAGNETIC INTRAOCULAR FOREIGN BODIES

Abstract

The greatly increased number of intraocular foreign body cases resulting from the accelerated industrial war effort and the nature of ocular combat injuries makes this subject of special interest to the ophthalmologist today. With the acceleration of industry has come the employment of huge numbers of unskilled, inexperienced personnel and a relative laxness in protective and preventive measures (goggles, shields, and so on). There has also been an increase of such cases in civilian life with wider use and misuse of poor quality tools, especially hammers, chisels, hatchets and improvised hand tools. We have seen this in patients coming from the farm and home. Moreover, the number of nonmagnetic foreign body cases has increased both in industry and in combat. Industry is now making greater use of various nonferrous metals and nonmagnetic alloys. The recognition by German and Italian forces in the early days of the North African desert campaigns