eye injury and the CAA
 

a friend of mine just got out of surgery on his eye having had a stone thrown on it. it buggered up his lens and having had the operation to lower his intraocular pressure he has discovered the lens on his eye was damaged too.

Docs have said they could replace the lens altogether or have a temporary contact lens stuck on top of the cracked one. Unfortunately the vision on the affected eye has fallen to 6/12 which probably takes him outside the CAA limits. He has stopped flying for now until things settle but is a little paranoid about the implications of the surgery on his flying career.

Whats the worst the CAA can do? How bad does an eye have to be even to rule him out of a multi crew limitation on his licence?
would appreciate it if people here can shed some light on this topic.
thanks in advance

The lens should not be a problem, but if the eye was damaged by impact, did the cornea or any other part of the lens encapsulation suffer damage?

I hope he had words with whoever threw that stone.
Jesus!

Jesus threw the stone?

Yes one third of the lens surrounding pocket has been broken. Cornea is not damaged. Now doctors are saying they can try to stitch a new artificial lens on top of my damaged one which involves some high risk or they can through away my damaged lens completely and just put a powerfool(+10) contact lens on the surface of my eye which I have to put on and take off everyday. Second option is safer in my case.
And it's not Jesus who threw the stone. Three young boys were driving in a car and shot the stone by using either a airgun or a pallet, while I was walking on the town centre to buy some food. I guess they injoyed their best by ruining someones eye for life.

I was so sorry to hear of this incident. The almost unbelievable callousness of some people beggars belief.

I see you mentioned a temporary lens. This implies that there may be a possible second stage, or long term plan that they have in mind. But if not, it would be my unqualified advice to assess the time-scales involved carefully. Get a precise guide on the time you have available to make such an important decision on the type of surgery that would be best in your case.

My guess is that if the correction was +10, the J/CAA would assess you as a one eyed pilot anyway; it's the equivalent of a ‘bottle' lens in specs. This may take away the pressure to have an operation just to get back to work. ( There are a few one eyed pilots about.)

To go the rest of your life with no lens would be tedious in the extreme, and the early removal might–I don't know of course–might just allow the encapsulation to collapse and heal in such a way that a/ it affected your vision somewhat. b/ it precluded the fitting of another lens in the future when techniques have evolved yet further.

There has to be a reason that the surgeons do not want to put a silicon or acrylic lens in the place of the damaged one. They may feel that it would affect the rear surface while it is vulnerable, or feel that there is not sufficient strength to hold the new lens in place. But, if retaining the damaged lens was possible--without the similar dangers mentioned re the removal, I would be inclined to search all possible avenues before committing myself.

So the main thing is to buy time to make decisions, and hopefully fly in the meantime if the powers that be feel you have enough experience to carry on with one eye. If this is the case, you will have rather better vision that a truly one eyed person and your brain will eventually learn to cope with it. It is really just a matter of getting over this very difficult period.

Thank you Loose Rivets for your sincere reply.

I was thinking the same thing too about buying some time before the opperation.

Only problem with leaving a partially ruptured lens capsule is, It has more chance of getting cloudier than actually recovering. According to Doc a torn capsule do not recover instead it worsen in time.

I don't understand why the Doc was not very interested about puting a capsule ring with a new lens. This is being done about 20% of cataract sergury anyway, specially with the elderly people who has very soft lens capsule which tends to rupture during the cataract opperation. I am 29.

Doc said different doc will have different opinion about the capsule ring. But he has 30 years of surgery experience in London Moorfields Eye hospital.

I certainly don't like the idea of having a loose contact lens in one of my eye for life. But that's what the Doc think is best for me !

I really don't know what to do!:sad:

It certainly is a difficult time for you, and I can only discuss this with you as little more than a sounding board while you think it through.

The expertise at Moorfields is world renowned, but sometimes new technologies are not taken up immediately...which is usually wise. However, in a case like yours, it would be nice to have a breathing space to search the world for more information, but it does sound like there is a need to press on with the treatment.

You have to balance several factors, not least of all annoying your existing doctor. While his or her professionalism will mean that they will do their very best possible for an average patient, (i.e. taking the safest route, with perhaps some disadvantages) it might be appropriate to stress the extreme affect this will have on your chosen career, and an element of risk in using new procedures may be something you want to weigh up.

During this time it may be good for you to start discussions with the Medical examiner to see if he thinks that you have enough experience to hold a licence with one eye. This gives you a worst possible scenario on which to base your plans. I know of one pilot that lost an eye when he was quite inexperienced. He is now in command of a jet transport aircraft.

I'll mention this to some of my acquaintances, but while they are interested in the science of hypothetical cases, when it comes to specifics cases, they become very guarded. I understand how they feel, but will ask anyway.

N.B. The clouding of the inner material is not uncommon--even after cataract surgery. There is a laser procedure for improving this, but I would not for one moment suggest relying on this.

Fayz76

There is another guy, practices at Walton Hospital, Liverpool. His name is Ian Marsh.

Might be worth getting another opinion off him - he is also a pilot as well as an opthalmic surgeon.

I am horrified to hear of what has happened to you - it's time the powers that be take steps to sort out the yobbos in this country.

Good luck
ariel

Thanks ariel and loose rivets for reply,

I did speak to my AME and CAA Eye specialist Roger Wilson and they both insured me that nither of those two operations will effect my license. But loose contact lens option can bring a restriction to flying only UK registered aircraft. Which does not really effect my job anyway. I don't have any intention to go out of the country right now.

Only thing which I can't get over is having a loose contact lens for rest of my life !

Other thing is, The Police could not even help me to catch those boys because CCTV was not working ! How sad is that ! They were not even bothered to come and take a statement from me, which they promised to do !

So be carefull guys, when you walk in Redhill town centre in Surrey !