Infectious conjunctivitis caused by Pseudomonasaeruginosa in infected and extrused scleral buckles

Abstract

Extrusion of the scleral buckle is one of the complications patients may encounter undergoing the surgical treatment for retinal detachment. We present two cases of persistent Pseudomonasaeruginosa-related conjunctivitis which infected the silicone explant after retinal surgery. One of them is a 73-year-old Caucasian female patient with hyperaemia, intense pain and mucopurulent discharge. After the conjunctival swabs detected a P. aeruginosa infection, she started both topical and systemic treatment without any results; for this reason we opted for the buckle removal always under systemic therapy. The second case is an 84-year-old Caucasian female patient with fever, periorbital oedema, chronic ocular pain, hyperaemia and purulent discharge. P. aeruginosa has also been detected in this case. No improvement with topical and systemic treatment, so this convinced us to remove patient's buckles and to continue systemic therapy. Both cases had the complete resolution after surgery. It is important to quickly recognise exposed scleral buckles because they can be a source of infections and a rare but threatening cause of endophthalmitis.