Airbags and bilateral eye injury: Five case reports and a review of the literature

We report five cases of bilateral eye injuries from airbag deployment in mo tor vehicle crashes and review the world's literature on ocular injuries as sociated with airbags, The cases in the literature were identified by cross -referencing Medline searches from airbags and ocular injuries. Additional cases were identified after review of references from each article in the s earch. An additional 89 cases from the literature were identified and are i ncluded for discussion. Patients were treated individually in a noncontroll ed, nonrandomized fashion according to the nature of each injury with regul ar follow-up examinations in clinic, Of the 94 cases studied, 24 (27%) were bilateral eye injuries, and 15 (16%) patients were wearing spectacles at t he time of the accident. The most common injuries included corneal abrasion s, eyelid trauma, and hyphemas, Outcomes ranged from complete resolution of symptoms and return of normal visual acuity to primary enucleation. This r eport describes the wide spectrum of eye injuries that may occur after airb ag deployment. We suggest a management plan for the evaluation and treatmen t of the ocular complications of airbag-related trauma, (C) 2001 Elsevier S cience Inc.