Fishing and eye injuries? A look at patterns, pediatric risk, and prevention

What happens when a routine day of casting a line turns into an ocular emergency? A long-term epidemiologic study of fishing-associated ocular injuries (FOIs) found that fishhooks, rods, and weights were among the most common mechanisms of injury, with pediatric patients comprising 38.2% of cases despite an overall decline in FOIs over the study period.¹ The findings, published in the American Journal of Ophthalmology, offer ophthalmologists and emergency physicians a framework for anticipating injury severity based on mechanism, from penetrating trauma to blunt-force complications such as open globe injury, infection, or orbital fracture.¹