Woman Gets Fat Injections in Eyelid to Resolve 'Facial Asymmetry' — and Five Stuck Contact Lenses Pop Out

A woman’s swollen eye turned out to be caused by contact lenses — specifically, five separate lenses — that had accumulated underneath her upper eyelid.

An “otherwise healthy” 33-year-old woman arrived at a plastic surgery clinic in China, wanting to repair her “facial contour asymmetry,” according to a case report published in Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery. To give her a more symmetrical look, doctors suggested a fat injection, which was done under sedation.

However, “while performing fat injection … several transparent contact lenses migrated from the upper fornix” — the space between the upper eyelid and eyeball. When her doctors turned her left upper eyelid inside out, “a total of five soft contact lenses were discovered.”

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When the fat was injected, it “compress[ed] the space … forcing the lenses out.”

The woman later confirmed that she had been wearing contact lenses for many years. “She recollected instances of losing her left contact lens several times many years prior. Interestingly, she had not experienced any ocular symptoms before this surgical intervention.”

The doctors warned that for other plastic surgeons treating patients with a similar facial contour asymmetry “there might be an increased potential for larger hidden spaces within the upper fornix, increasing risk of dislodged contact lenses being hidden.”

The "soft and hydrophilic nature of the soft contact lenses also makes them less noticeable," the report noted.

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This isn’t the first time doctors have discovered multiple contact lenses dislodged in someone's eye: In California, an ophthalmologist went viral after sharing a video of herself removing 23 contact lenses from underneath the patient’s eye.

In that case, the patient had forgotten to remove them.

As for why people don't appear to experience any physical discomfort from these lenses, Dr. Katarina Kurteeva, an ophthalmologist at California Eye Associates in Newport Beach, told ABC7: "As you wear contact lenses for many years, over 20 to 30 years, our cornea, which is the most sensitive part of the eye, becomes desensitized, which is essentially a protective feature, because otherwise you'd be really bothered by everyday contact lens wear … After all, it is a foreign body in your eye."

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You should always remove your contact lenses before sleeping at night. As the Cleveland Clinic notes, “Is sleeping with contacts safe? The short answer? No.” It raises the risk of eye ulcers, infection, and yes, the lenses migrating.

“Even if you’re just resting your eyes to take a quick nap, you should still pop out those contacts. Falling asleep for any amount of time increases your risk for irritation or infection.”

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