EyeRounds Online Atlas of Ophthalmology

Contributor: William Charles Caccamise, Sr, MD, Retired Clinical Assistant Professor of Ophthalmology, University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry

*Dr. Caccamise has very generously shared his images of patients taken while operating during the "eye season" in rural India as well as those from his private practice during the 1960's and 1970's. Many of his images are significant for their historical perspective and for techniques and conditions seen in settings in undeveloped areas.

Category: Cornea

Cornea: recurrent corneal abrasion

The patient's history is extremely important in avoiding a missed diagnosis. Corneal abrasions that are followed by recurrent corneal abrasion are frequently due to finger nail scratches, Christmas tree scratches, and outdoor tree branch scratches. Mothers are so frequently scratched by their babies' fingernails that the condition is known as fingernail keratitis.In the photo, the nebular area in juxtaposition to the light reflex represents the abnormal corneal epithelium of recurrent corneal abrasion at the earlier site of a baby's fingernail scratch of the mother's cornea. Fluorescein staining was evident with slit-lamp examination.

Ophthalmic Atlas Images by EyeRounds.org, The University of Iowa are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.