What are the symptoms of photokeratitis?
If you have photokeratitis, you may experience one or more of the following symptoms:
- Eye pain or redness.
- Tearing/watery eyes.
- Blurry vision.
- Swelling.
- Light sensitivity.
- Gritty sensation in your eyes.
Other symptoms include:
- Seeing halos.
- Headaches.
- Twitching of your eyelids.
- Temporary vision loss (rare).
- Color changes in your vision (rare).
The symptoms may last from six to 24 hours, but they usually disappear within 48 hours. The longer you’re exposed to UV light, the more severe your symptoms might be.
What causes photokeratitis?
Ultraviolet rays can damage your eyes. UV-A and UV-B rays from the sun can cause short- and long-term damage to your eyes and affect your vision. The ozone layer absorbs UV-C radiation, so those rays don’t damage your eyes.
Besides direct sunlight, other sources of ultraviolet light that can cause photokeratitis include:
- Sunlight that’s reflected into your eyes from snow, ice, water, sand or cement.
- Lamps used in tanning beds or booths.
- Laser light.
- Mercury vapor lamps or halogen desk lamps.
- Lightning or electric sparks.
- Arc welding equipment or photographic flood lamps.
- Light used to disinfect or used as medical treatment.
Staring directly at the sun, such as during a solar eclipse, can cause more long-lasting and considerable damage — a burn — to your retina.
What are the risk factors for photokeratitis?
You’re at greater risk of getting photokeratitis if you:
- Spend a lot of time outdoors in the sun, doing activities like mountain climbing, hiking, skiing swimming.
- Use a sunlamp, tanning bed or work or spend time in environments where there’s a UV light source.
- Live in higher altitudes (greater exposure to UV rays) or in the U.S. sunbelt, which is the southern part of the country below the 36th parallel.
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What are the complications of photokeratitis?
Long-term exposure to even small amounts of UV radiation can increase your risk of developing a cataract or macular degeneration. UV exposure adds up over time. Long-term UV exposure can also cause tissue elevations on the surface of your eye. These are called pingueculae and pterygia. Using sunglasses faithfully when outdoors may limit these.
Blue and violet shorter-wavelength visible light, emitted from LED lights, computers and smartphones, can also be harmful to your retina and be a risk factor for macular degeneration later in life.
