It’s always fun when my buddies come and see me at the office. They always put stuff on their history form like they’re pregnant or allergic to bullets just to see if I pay attention.

I’ve also noticed a pattern. They ask how I’m doing and I go: check this out and pull out the iPad to show them cool eyeballs that I just saw. Of course there is nothing to identify the patient in the photo so if you’re looking to hit the HIPAA whistleblower lottery, you’re gonna have to keep looking.

Without further ado I present a short collection of cool eyeballs where most everyone simply came in complaining that their eyes were irritated.

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Bullseye! I love this patient. He thought his eye had been hurting for four days because he had a stye. Nope-chunk of metal dead center of your cornea my friend.

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We often use cobalt blue light and sodium fluorescein dye to highlight irregularities on the ocular surface. See that faint line yellow line running behind the eyelashes? It’s called the Line of Marx (different guy – save the Obama comments). This buildup of dead cells works like a dam blocking beautiful olive oil consistency tears from lubricating your peepers.

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This 6 year old was sent over from the pediatrician. No it’s not melanoma – just a little flat rock that was really suctioned on.

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“Got some metal in my eye, waited three days, went to ER, they took it out, but a week later and it still hurts.” Yep-gotta get the rust out and that ain’t happening at the ER, Urgent Care, Primary Care doc, etc.

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Uhmm. Ouch. You know how your lips get chapped? Yeah your cornea can sort of do that too when it gets really dry. This one was sad because this lady was in her 70s with long term Diabetes damage so her nerves are jacked up preventing the eye from helping heal itself.

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Lard, butter, crisco take your pick for the analogy. Once again, those glands along the eyelid are supposed to secrete olive oil (vegetable oil, Wesson oil, etc.) consistency tears. If the glands ain’t happy-ain’t nobody happy.

So what’s the point of all this? Eyeballs are neato and irritated eyes can be caused by lots of different things.