EYE INJURIES DURING TRAINING EXERCISES WITH PAINT BALLS

The use of paint balls, increasingly popular for mar games and surviva l games, has recently been introduced for certain military training ex ercises. We treated two soldiers who had severe permanent ocular damag e after being hit by these balls. Both removed their goggles after the ir vision was obscured with paint from a hit on these protective lense s. They mere then hit for a second time, resulting in the eye injury, Based on these cases and on a literature review, me conclude that prot ective eye gear should be mandatory when paint pellets are used. It is essential that service members participating in such exercises be ins tructed not to remove their protective goggles under any circumstances .