What’s Surfers Eye and How To Avoid It

Would you like to have a wing-like membrane growing over your eye? If the answer is something along the lines of ‘Eww, no’ then you really should read on.

Anyone is prone to this benign growth, so prevention is of uttermost importance. By reading on you will find out just how you could get this wing-like growth and what the best ways are to go about preventing it.

Firstly the growth that I am talking about has the medical name Pteryhium, which is the Greek word for “wing”. This type of growth is not just specific to the eye, it can occur anywhere on the human body.

However for the purpose of this article we are only concerned with conjuctival pterygium more commonly known as ‘surfers eye’.

So what exactly is surfers eye?

Now is time to find out!

Surfers eye refers to a benign (non-life-threatening) growth of the conjuctiva. The conjuctiva is what lines the inside of the eyelid and covers the sclera (the white part of the eye).

The growth varies greatly in appearance but is always triangular in shape and most commonly grows from the nasal side of the sclera, the definite reason to why this is still not entirely clear.

One argument that has been put forward is that surfers eye is formed this way due to the angle that the suns rays enter the eye.

The seriousness of surfers eye can be determined by looking at both the colour and size of the growth. Small and pink growths tend to be less serious than the larger red growths.

The intensity of the symptoms can also be used as a determinant of the seriousness of surfers eye. More developed growths will cause more dryness of the eye and will affect your vision more adveresely.

So now you know what surfers eye is it is time to learn what the 2 main causes are.

The most prominent cause of surfers eye is ultraviolet rays or put simply sunlight. The suns rays are intensified to a greater extent by reflection off the water.

This is why this growth is known as surfers eye as surfers are the people who are at the greatest risk of developing it due to long periods of time spent on water in the sun.

The ultraviolet rays cause conjuctival pterygium to develop as they damage the thin membrane of the eye, which cause larger tissues to begin growing (Msnbc.com).

Dust is the other cause of surfers eye. Like sunlight dust damages the thin membrane of the eye causing larger tissues to start growing and forming the wing-like-membrane.

Dust is also one of the reasons believed to be the cause of the dryness of the eye which is a common symptom those with surfers eye suffer from.

Now you know the cause of surfers eye surely you want to know how best to prevent it?

The number one prevention is simply eye care.

The growth affects the eye so the only way to prevent surfers eye from forming is to protect your eyes well.

Sunglasses can be used, however for a number of reasons they are also impractical. For example if you wore glasses whilst on the water they could easily fog up from the ocean spray or fly straight off if you fall from your board.

For these two reasons a better solution for your eye care would be to use lenses. Contact lenses will not fog up or fly off if you fall. They are also widely available both on the high street and online.

One other method to prevent surfers eye is the use of artificial tears whilst you are out surfing. Artificial tears will keep the eyes moist preventing dryness of the eye which is a common symptom of surfers eye.

If you adhere to both these prevention methods then surfers eye will be kept at bay!

So there you have it, you now know what exactly surfers eye is and the two best methods you should adopt in order to prevent the dreaded wing-like-membrane developing on your eye!