Deepavali leaves a trail of firecracker injuries to the eyes in Hyderabad

Among the patients kept under observation was a nine-year-old boy from the village of Burgul near Shadnagar who sat on a bench rocking his body to manage the pain in the right eye.

Hyderabad and its surrounding districts logged 42 firecracker eye injury cases between November 2 and November 5. “We had 35 firecracker injury cases which we treated in the out-patient section and discharged them; seven had serious injuries out whom four have been kept under observation, while three required surgical intervention,” informed an eye surgeon at the Sarojini Devi Eye Hospital. The SD Eye Hospital is the tertiary eye-care institution in Telangana.

In the last 24 hours, the hospital logged 31 firecracker injury cases. “Yesterday we received a case from Nizamabad (200 km from Hyderabad) with severe eye injury and we performed a surgery on him. Another young boy has had multiple foreign particles lodged in and around the eye and is being operated on,” informed Dr. Najafi Begum, RMO of SD Eye Hospital. “We are not sure whether two of them will regain sight in the injured eye. We are treating them with powerful antibiotics to prevent infections,” said Dr. Najafi.

The OPD section of the hospital was teeming with patients and their relatives as the hospital has deployed additional medical personnel expecting a surge in cases due to Deepavali. “We are expecting more patients will be brought in from the surrounding districts of Hyderabad and the number of people with firecracker injuries to the eyes is likely to go up,” said Dr. Najafi.

Among the patients kept under observation was a nine-year-old boy from the village of Burgul near Shadnagar who sat on a bench rocking his body to manage the pain in the right eye. The village is about 65 km from Hyderabad. “He was bursting crackers and one of them didn’t light up. When he tried to see, it lit up damaging the eye,” said K. Rajkumar, the father the boy. While the boy was injured at 2.30 p.m. on Wednesday, he was brought to the hospital at 9 p.m.

The doctors expect a full recovery for the boy. However, the prognosis for firecracker injuries to the eyes is grim. “Nothing can be guaranteed in serious eye injury cases for three months. Infections are common,” said an eye surgeon at the hospital.