Something in Your Eye? Chemical Splash, Dust and Safe Flushing

If a chemical has splashed into your eye (chuna from paan, bleach, toilet cleaner, cement), start rinsing with clean running water right now and keep going for 15 to 20 minutes, then go to a hospital even if it feels better. For dust or an eyelash, a gentle flush usually works in a minute; this guide shows how, what never to put in an eye, and when “something in eye” means the emergency room.

Chemical in the eye: what to do in the first minute

Chemicals burn the clear front window of the eye (the cornea) within seconds, and they keep on burning until they’re washed away, which is exactly why the rinse matters more than the drive to hospital. Every second counts. Alkalis are the worst. Chuna (slaked lime, the white paste in paan), cement, drain openers, bleach and oven cleaners soak deeper into the eye than most acids do, and the damage can look mild for the first hour.

1. Shout for help and go to the nearest tap, shower or water bottle. Don’t hunt for anything special.
2. Hold the eyelids open with two fingers. The eye will want to squeeze shut; that’s normal, keep holding.
3. Pour a gentle, steady stream of lukewarm clean water from the inner corner (near the nose) outward, so the water runs away from the other eye.
4. Roll the eye up, down and side to side while the water runs.
5. If contact lenses are in, take them out once you’ve started rinsing, only if they come out easily. Don’t stop the rinse to fight with a lens.
6. Keep going for 15 to 20 minutes. Use a phone timer. It feels far too long. It isn’t.
7. Then go straight to a hospital emergency or eye unit. Take the bottle or label of the chemical with you. Call 1122 in Pakistan or 112 or 108 in India if you can’t get there safely.

With dry chuna or cement powder, brush it off the lids and face with a dry cloth first, then rinse. For a child, lay them on their back and pour from a jug while a second adult holds the lids.

Clean water or saline: which one to use

Sterile saline (the eye-wash bottles sold at chemists) is ideal. Clean drinking water is perfectly fine if that’s what you have, and for a chemical splash, water now beats saline in ten minutes. Bottled water, filtered water or tap water all work for a one-off flush.

The one firm exception is contact lenses. Never rinse, store or wet a contact lens with tap water, because tap water can carry a tiny organism called Acanthamoeba that causes a severe eye infection in lens wearers. If you wear lenses and get something in your eye, take the lens out, flush the eye, and throw that lens away or clean it in fresh lens solution.

How to get dust, grit or an eyelash out

Most “something in eye” moments are a speck of dust on a windy day, an eyelash or sand, and tears, the eye’s own washing system, often clear it within a minute or two if you just don’t rub. Hands off.

1. Wash your hands with soap. Look in a mirror in good light.
2. Blink slowly several times. Let the tears come.
3. Pull the upper eyelid gently out and down over the lower lashes, hold for 2 to 3 seconds, then let go. The lower lashes can sweep the underside of the upper lid.
4. Pull the lower lid down and look up. If you see the speck on the white or the inside of the lid, flush it with a small cup of clean water or saline, or touch it lightly with the tip of a moist, clean cotton bud (only on the lid or the white, never on the coloured part).
5. Fill a clean cup or eye-bath with water, lower your open eye into it and blink a few times. A shower on low pressure, aimed at your forehead, works too.
6. If it’s still there after about 10 minutes of gentle flushing, stop and get it seen the same day.

After a speck comes out, the eye can feel scratchy for a few hours from a small surface scratch, which usually settles within a day; if it’s just as strong the next morning, get checked, because scratches can get infected and particles hide under the upper lid.

Windy days and andhi dust storms are when this happens most. Plain glasses or sunglasses on a motorbike stop more grit than any after-care.

How do you know you have something in your eye (and when it’s not that)

A foreign body usually feels like a sharp, scratchy grain that gets worse when you blink or move the eye. The eye waters, goes red and wants to stay shut. Light may hurt. Often you can point to one spot, though grit trapped under the upper lid can feel like it’s everywhere.

“Something in eye but nothing there” is a common search, and the answer is usually one of three things:

• A scratch. The speck left, but the scratch it made still feels exactly like a speck.
• A particle under the upper lid. You can’t see it without flipping the lid, which a doctor does in seconds.
• Dry eye or conjunctivitis (aankh aana). Both give a gritty, sandy feeling in both eyes, often with sticky discharge in conjunctivitis. Grit is usually one eye and sudden.

Gritty past a day? Get it seen.

Metal, glass or high-speed particles: go to hospital

Grinding metal, hammering nails, chiselling stone, cutting tiles or using a strimmer can fire a tiny piece into the eye at such speed that it goes right through the surface with little pain at first. Don’t be fooled. A metal chip left in place can rust and stain the eye within a day.

• Don’t rinse hard, don’t rub, don’t try to lift it out.
• Cover the eye loosely with a paper cup or clean folded cloth taped around it, so nothing presses on the eyeball.
• Go to hospital now. Anyone with blood in the eye, a changed pupil shape or blurred vision needs the emergency department, not a clinic queue.

If something is stuck in the eye and sticking out, never pull it. Put a paper cup over it without touching it and get help.

What not to put in your eye

Myth: surma, rose water or a drop of milk “cleans” the eye

They feel soothing, but they add particles, germs or both to an eye that’s already scratched. Many surma and kajal products contain lead, which is why the site’s guide on surma and kajal for babies says to skip them. Rose water and milk aren’t sterile.

Myth: rubbing helps it come out

Rubbing drags the speck across the cornea like sandpaper and can push it under the lid. Blink and flush instead.

Also skip redness drops, a friend’s numbing drops, honey, oil and herbal washes.

Red flags and surprising facts

• Did you know? Alkali burns (chuna, cement, bleach) are usually more dangerous than acid burns, because alkalis keep soaking into eye tissue while acids tend to form a barrier.
• Did you know? The cornea has more pain nerves per square millimetre than almost anywhere else in the body, which is why a grain you can barely see feels like a pebble.
• Did you know? A tiny iron chip can leave a brown rust ring on the eye within hours, so “it doesn’t hurt much” isn’t a reason to wait.

Something in eye: questions people ask

More eye guides live in our Eye Care section.