Purpose
To examine weather patients with an eye injury coming to a Danish emergency room without assistance from an ophthalmic specialist were admitted correctly to an ophthalmic specialist or ophthalmic ward.
Methods
All files containing The International Classification of Diseases 10 DS05 (injury of eye and orbit) and DT15 (foreign body on external eye) was found in the Patient Administrative System (FPAS, County of Funen, Denmark) of Svendborg Hospital, Denmark during a 5‐year period (11.01.07–10.31.12). A total of 1,824 patients were registered. From these files patients with a history of (1) trauma against the eye region and/or objective signs of eye trauma or (2) history of hammering against metal or stone were reviewed.
Results
Twenty‐four patients were included. Eighteen patients had obvious signs of severe eye injury with one or more of the following signs: Decreased visual acuity (n = 14); irregular pupil (n = 4); no pupillary reflex (n = 4); hyphaema (n = 3); open injury visual to the naked eye (n = 2); subconjunctival haemorrhage (n = 2). All eighteen patients were immediately transferred to an ophthalmological ward (n = 15) or private ophthalmic specialist (n = 3). Six patients had a history of hammering against stone or metal, but had no signs of severe ocular injury. Later on, one of these patients contacted an ophthalmic specialist because of continued eye symptoms. An orbital CT‐scan was performed, but no intraocular foreign body was found. The other five patients responded by filling out a questionnaire remarking not to have had any ocular symptoms following the trauma.
Conclusions
During a 5‐year period there was no severe misdiagnosis of patients with ocular trauma in a Danish emergency room without assistance from an ophthalmic specialist.