EYE ANESTHESIA

Retrobulbar and peribulbar anesthetic injections are standard routine to allow delicate and complex eye surgery without the general and ophthalmic risks of general anesthesia.

Many ophthalmic surgeons give their own anesthetic injections, but others prefer to have them given by specially-trained anesthetists[1]. In either case, injections are occasionally misplaced into the eye itself or into the optic nerve at the back of the eye. The consequent damage may be irremediable and severe loss of vision result.

PRACTICE POINT Misplaced retrobulbar and peribulbar injections are often indefensible.

The long myopic (short-sighted) eye is particularly at risk[2], and analysis[3] has shown that these tragic incidents are frequently but not always the result of violation of well-documented technique[4], [5], [6].

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