The leech fell into Tony's eyes probably during a photography expedition where he had snapped a king bird-of-paradise (Pic: Kennedy News/Tony Exall)
A British man’s holiday became a nightmare after he discovered a leech was sucking on his eyeball, days after he was uncomfortable in the eye. For 58-year-old Tony Exall, who was on an adventure trip near West Papua in Indonesia, his left eye had been irritated.
Soon, it began to continuously itch – something he initially blamed on sweating and humidity in the area. However, once the itching became too much to handle, he visited a doctor, who found the leech stuck to his eyeball. A horrifying photo shows Tony's bloodshot eye with the small black bloodsucker latched to the white area called the sclera.
The doctor then extracted the leech using tweezers, despite the creature pulling on his eyeball tissue to hang on.
How did the leech stick to Tony’s eyes?
According to Tony, the leech fell into his eyes probably during a photography expedition where he had snapped a king bird-of-paradise minutes before the incident. “I go to investigate different places to work with in Indonesia, so I thought, while I'm here, I want to do a bit of bird snapping,” said Tony, who owns a travel company and belongs to Surrey in England.
"We were waiting for the bird to turn up, and I was sweating buckets. I could feel something in my eye, but I just thought it was a bug. I tried to get rid of it but couldn't, so I tried to ignore it,” he added. "There were leeches everywhere, and I must have used the back of my hand to wipe the sweat, so I essentially wiped it into my eye.”
After the leech was pulled off his eye, the doctor prescribed him eye drops and antibiotics to make sure Tony did not develop any infection.
Signs and symptoms of a foreign object in your eyes
If you have a foreign object in your eye, you probably will have immediate symptoms. You may experience:
- A feeling of pressure or discomfort
- A sensation that something is in the eye
- Pain in the eyes
- Extreme tearing
- Pain when you look at light
- Excessive blinking
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Redness or a bloodshot eye
How to take care of your eyes in case of a foreign object?
According to experts, if a foreign object gets in your eye, the first step is to avoid rubbing your eye, as it can only worsen the injury – leading to an infection.
When a foreign object strikes your eye, it will most likely affect the cornea or the conjunctiva. The cornea is a clear dome that covers the front surface of the eye. It serves as a protective covering for the front of the eye. Light enters the eye through the cornea. It also helps focus light on the retina at the back of the eye. The conjunctiva is the thin mucous membrane that covers the sclera, or the white of the eye. The conjunctiva runs to the edge of the cornea. It also covers the moist area under the eyelids.
A few ways you can take care of your eyes include:
- Do not rub your eye, as this could make it worse. Sit down facing a light.
- Gently open your eyelids with your thumbs.
- If you can see something, wash it out by pouring clean water from the inner corner of a glass or jug
- If this doesn’t work and the object is still on the surface of the eye, try to remove it with a moist piece of gauze or the damp corner of a clean handkerchief or tissue.
- If the object isn’t easy to remove or the eye is very painful, seek medical advice.
