Penetrating Eyelid and Ocular Fishhook-Related Injury

To report removal techniques and outcomes for a patient with penetrating eyelid and cornea complicating localized retinal detachment from a fishhook.

This is a case report of a 35-year-old man who presented with a fishhook embedded in his right upper eyelid and globe while participating in a fishing competition. On initial examination, his right eyelid was opened with difficulty and limited evaluation could be performed.

In an operating room, a shank was transected and removed from a lacerated eyelid by a back-out technique. Then, a barbed hook was noticed to penetrate through temporal peripheral cornea, iris, and entrapped within ciliary body behind the lens. A successful surgical removal of a fishhook was performed within a primary operation. After that, additional operations to repair injured ocular tissues including a localized retinal detachment were performed. The patient achieved a best-corrected visual acuity of 20/20 at 10-month follow-up.

The visual prognosis for a fishhook-related ocular injury is associated with various variables including size and location of lacerated wound and technique to remove a fishhook. In this case, a patient could achieve a favorable final visual and anatomical outcome. This removal technique could be taken into consideration when encountering a fishhook-related eye injury patient.