By Gregg Zoroya, USA TODAY
Eye trauma, from sight impairment to blindness, is now among the most common wounds for U.S. troops engaged in combat.
At least 1,126 U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan have suffered eye wounds requiring surgery, with half incurring temporary blindness in one or both eyes, according to Army statistics.
Eye damage constitutes from 10.7% to 13% of all serious wounds suffered by U.S. troops in Iraq and Afghanistan that require evacuation from the war zone, say current and former Army ophthalmologists.
That is the highest percentage for eye wounds for any major conflict dating back to World War I, according to 1997 research published in the Survey of Ophthalmology.
Because of the increasing number of eye injuries, lawmakers have introduced bipartisan legislation to create a $5 million Pentagon-based center for research and treatment of damaged eyes. The bill would also create a registry to track wounds and their treatment.
"It still is hard for us to understand how such a significant injury as combat eye wounds could have been below everyone's radar screen for four years of war," said Thomas Zampieri,director of government relations for the 12,000-member Blinded Veterans Association. He's scheduled to testify today before the House Committee on Veterans' Affair.
Rep. John Boozman, R-Ark., an optometrist and co-sponsor of the eye-wound legislation, said, "The more data we can obtain, the better off we'll be."
The number of eye injuries may be larger in Iraq because the casualty data is incomplete for each year of that war and includes almost no figures for 2007, said Col. Robert Mazzoli, ophthalmology consultant to the Army surgeon general. But even the current tally is double the 650 troops who have suffered major amputations, which includes anything more than a finger or toe.
Doctors say insurgent roadside bomb, grenade and mortar attacks send hundreds of pieces of flying metal that cause many of the eye wounds.
Since 2004, the Army and Marines have required all soldiers to wear eye protection. Such protection, however, doesn't always block blast effects, which cause 80% of eye injuries, the Army says.
Placing fully equipped ophthalmologists into battlefield hospitals has saved troops' eyes, said retired Army Col. Thomas Ward, an ophthalmologist. Full or partial sight is restored in most cases.
Where soldiers in Vietnam stood a 50-50 chance of losing an eye, eye removal is now down to 13%, according to Ward and Army Maj. Eric Weichel, an eye surgeon.
The proposed bill would help track what can be a series of restorative surgeries for eye cases so military doctors and the Department of Veterans Affairs can understand the servicemember's full medical history.
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