ABSTRACT
Corneal injuries remain an important cause of avoidable and, predominantly, monocular visual morbidity, themain strategy to prevent these injuries has been to educate people to identify high-risk situations and to takecorrect action to avoid danger. Present study conducted in the department of ophthalmology of Raichur instituteof Medical sciences teaching Hospital, with 49 patients of ocular trauma above 14 years of either sex wassubjected to slit lamp examination to ensure the cornea is involved the etiology of the injury was noted. Then thepattern of the corneal injury was studied under the slit lamp examination. The Prevalence of corneal blindnesswas 10.20% (5) were had corneal blindness in both eyes and 24.49% (12) were had corneal blindness in one eyein Raichur. The majority of corneal injuries are avoidable. Eye health promotion strategies are warranted toraise awareness about the causes and prevention of corneal blindness.
ABSTRACT
PURPOSE: Alternaria spp. is opportunistic fungus and the most prevalent cause of asthma and allergic disease. Keratitis caused by the fungus Alternariaspp. is quite rare. The authors performed an epidemiological study to identify the risk factor and to evaluate clinical manifestations, methods and results of treatment in Alternaria keratitis. METHODS: Epidemiological study of Alternaria keratitis was performed prospectively under the identical protocol from April 1995 to May 2000 in 5 hospitals. RESULTS: Seven cases of Alternaria keratitis were identified by culture with corneal scraping or corneal biopsy. They were 8.5% of the 82 cases of fungal keratitis. Of the 7 patients, 5 were men (71.4%). All patients were over 50 years and 5 of them (71.4%) were farmers. In terms of trauma history, 6 out of 7 patients had previous history of corneal traumas, and most of these corneal traumas were vegetable matter-related. CONCLUSIONS: The most common (83.3%) predisposing factor for Alternaria keratitis was vegetable matter-related corneal trauma. The prompt referral for diagnostic studies and specific antifungal management, or surgical therapy might be helpful to reduce the incidence rate of complication of keratomycoses.