Can you go blind if you get water in your eyes w/ contacts?

Question

I have heard that if you open your eyes underwater with contacts, or get water in them someway, you can go blind. I'm not saying that right when you get water in your eyes with contacts on you'll go blind, I mean if something happens like a bacterial water that you happen to be swimming in gets in your eyes. Would that only cause you to go blind if you sleep with them and wear them constantly?

My father yells at me for wearing them in the pool, but I take my contacts out every night before I head to bed and soak them in solution. Therefore, I don't think anything would cause me to go blind in that short amount of time that I had the contacts in.

Can anyone verify this for me?

Answer 1

I am a certified Medical Assistant

You should not swim with them if you do not have too.

You can get a bacterial infection but it has been mostly linked to some solutions used for lens cleaning

Answer 2

The contacts can soak up bacteria and other pathogens and spread them to your eye.  Even if you take out your contacts afterwards, you've already potentially introduced the pathogen into your eye.  

And contact solution isn't tested against and able to kill all kinds of pathogens, so if you run into something particularly nasty in the pool, your solution may not even be able to do anything against it.  

Of course people ignore these facts and wear contacts in pools anyways (yourself included) and don't end up getting infections, but you are really putting your eyes at risk if you do.

Is it possible to go blind from one of these infections?  Probably, but hopefully you would get successful treatment before it progressed too much.

I suggest not wearing contacts in the pool or getting some good goggles to keep the water away from your eyes.  :)

Answer 3

Don't because they're not meant for water and can cause infections.