Eye Injuries and The Potential Impact on Your Life

Posted on Wednesday September 16, 2020

There are many ways you can suffer damage to your eyes while working as a defense contractor. Eye injuries can impact your life in many ways, and it is important to ensure that you receive the Defense Base Act (DBA) benefits you deserve. 

About 2.4 million people in the United States sustain traumatic eye injuries each year, and about 20,000 of those happen at work. Just as eye injuries happen regularly to domestic workers, they can also happen to people working overseas on United States defense contracts. 

Eye injuries can affect your life – and sometimes, the rest of your life – in many costly ways. If you sustained an eye injury while working overseas, you should always ensure you receive maximum benefits from a Defense Base Act (DBA) claim. Do not wait to contact DBA attorneys for assistance with the claims process from start to finish. 

Common Eye Injuries

Our eyes are key parts of our body, yet they are also delicate and can be injured in many ways. Some common eye injuries on the job include the following:

• Corneal abrasions
• Penetrating eye injuries
• Chemical burns to the eye
• Blunt trauma
• Exposure to light

The above can lead to many complications, such as:

• Ruptured globe
• Traumatic iritis
• Eye swelling
• Subconjunctival hemorrhage (bleeding of the eye)
• Hyphemas (bleeding of the eye’s anterior chamber)
• Orbital blowout fractures

Traumatic eye injuries can lead to many issues, including high sensitivity to light, severe pain, chronic double vision, chronic blurred vision, vision loss, or even blindness in one or both eyes. 

Effects of Eye Injuries

Most eye injuries are immediately painful – and often excruciatingly so. The pain from an eye injury can overtake your life while you receive treatment, and it can make it difficult or impossible to sleep or participate in your usual activities, including working. Even as your eye injury heals and pain subsides, you might be left with chronic effects that impact your vision. 

Vision issues can prevent you from driving, reading, working, or even living without assistance in extreme cases. Many people who lose vision due to eye injuries experience depression and anxiety as they adjust to life with a vision impairment. In addition, some eye injuries require surgery and can result in permanent disfigurement. 

The losses from severe work-related eye injuries can be great. If you are covered by the DBA, you should be able to receive benefits for:

• All of your medical treatment relating to your eye injury
• Lost income if you miss work due to your injury
• Long-term impairments and disabilities if your eye injury prevents you from returning to your previous work

It is important that you get the full benefits you deserve, which will help you move forward with your eye injuries and their lasting effects. 

Contact Experienced DBA Attorneys Today

At The Mara Law Firm, we know that a work-related eye injury can have a major and lasting impact on your life. Do not risk missing out on important Defense Base Act benefits that you deserve – instead, contact a DBA lawyer for help with your claim. Call (619) 234-2833 or contact us online to learn more about how we can help you.