General Accidents - Injuries to the Eye and Ear

1. How to Treat Injuries to the Eye. - There are certain trifling accidents that give rise to great pain, and which, if not attended to promptly may lead to serious consequences. Thus, in travelling by train or motor particles of cinder, sand, or grit occasionally lodge in the eye sac and give rise to great pain. The important thing is to avoid rubbing the eye, as pressure only tends to embed the article in the membrane covering the eyeball. Nature provides a remedy for this particular injury in the form of tears, which, if allowed to collect and fall, will often raising the eyelid and wiping off the foreign body with a clean handkerchief rolled to a point. Let the patient lean firmly back against the operator, who will thus be able to hold the eye open In-turning the upper lid back over a match or small piece of wood (fig. 1). If the particle is so firmly embedded that it cannot be wiped off, a drop of olive oil or castor oil should be dropped on the eyeball, and the eye covered with a bandage until medical aid can be procured.

remove the offending particle. If this fails,

Fig. 1. Removing a grain of dust from the eye blowing the nose very hard sometimes drains away the tears with the hard granule. Failing se simple remedies, help must be given by

By accident a drop of corrosive fluid may be splashed into the eye, and most prompt treatment must be applied to neutralise the effect of the fluid. An acid splash should be treated by applying an alkali, of which the bicarbonates of soda and of potash are the best among homely remedies; while an alkali should be neutralised by bathing the eye with weak vinegar.

2. Foreign Bodies in the Ear. - Lovers of rural life often experience the unpleasant sensation of a small insect in the ear, which in its efforts to extricate itself seems to produce deafening noises. The treatment is very simple. The patient should have the head supported with the affected ear upwards, and into the channel of the ear should be poured a little olive oil, which should be made lukewarm by placing it in a teaspoon over a lighted candle. The drowned insect will float on the oil. whence it can be removed, while the ear can be drained by absorbing the oil with cotton-wool.

Some enterprising children are very fond of putting peas, beads, and stones in the ear, and occasionally one gets pushed in so far as to become fast. This occasions an injury which should not be meddled with by the lay person, unless medical aid is quite unobtainable. Then, by pressing against the ear with the point of a ball-pointed pen, the foreign body may be eased so as to fall out when the head is bent over; but if medical aid is possible the only first aid treatment advisable is to prevent the child touching the ear, either by covering it with a bandage or by tying the child's hands.