Q: I underwent a retinal detachment treatment including silicon oil in my left eye because of an accident. The first operation was a failure and immediately second operation was done and now my eye is stable. I wanted to know, is there any risk in my other eye as after the accident I was not having any sign of injury in the right eye. The accident happened 8 months back. I am still under treatment at Sankara Nethralaya.

A:Damage associated with injury to eye usually remain localised to that eye or the immediate surrounding structures. Risk to the other eye which has not received any direct/indirect trauma is very small and rare, more so after 8 months of injury. A condition called sympathetic ophthalmia in which inflammation develops in the unaffected eye due to trauma to the other eye occurs specially in cases where there is extensive perforating trauma / trauma occurs in the region of ciliary body (part of eye)/ there is retained intraocular foreign body. Since you are already under treatment at Sankara Nethralaya which is a premier eye centre in India, your left eye injury must have been examined in detail for damage to the same eye and risk of sympathetic ophthalmia to the other eye.