Deployed personnel in Iraq are not allowed, under any circumstances, to wear contact lenses. This regulation, officially put forth in Army DA PAM 40-506, is widely disseminated during CRC and other pre-deployment screenings, and is advertised on AFN and the walls of clinics and other buildings throughout the combat zone. But it remains widely ignored, in most cases because the alternative—wearing eyeglasses—is simply unacceptable, even unthinkable, to many soldiers. (If you’ve seen the Army-issue “BCGs,” a.k.a. “birth control glasses,” you will better understand this mentality.)

However, this particular rule is a pretty important one. The very fine silt-like dust in Iraq, along with the inability to keep hands clean for insertion and removal—all of this makes contact lens wear dangerous, and every Army optometrist and ophthalmologist has horror stories about eye infections, corneal ulcers, and subsequent permanent loss of vision in soldiers who have worn contacts in the field.

With that preface, I relate to you the following incident, which took place in our optometry clinic on Thursday:

A soldier, let’s call him “Private Eyegoo,” walks into clinic with his Non-Commissioned Officer in tow. Chief complaint: “It feels like there is something in my right eye, and there is yellow stuff on my eyelids in the morning.” On further questioning, the patient also complained of swollen lids, and itchiness of the right eye.

Our optometrist, sensing something very familiar about this particular complaint, asked the soldier if he had worn contact lenses at any time while being deployed. The soldier stated resolutely that he had not EVER worn contact lenses in Iraq, and went on to elaborate in detail how his NCO had seen him attempting to insert lenses in Kuwait and informed him that this was not allowed, so he had put them away, and never touched them again. “I haven’t worn any contacts for months.”

(It is right about at this point in my little narrative that the alert blog reader will begin to suspect that perhaps Private Eyegoo is not telling the whole truth. What makes this one more interesting is that “not-so-honest” is about to meet up with “not-so-smart”—a combination which is nearly 100% lethal to a military career.)

A few moments later, as the patient was examined, our fine optometrist noted an ocular surface infection in the right eye. But he also noticed something else: at that very moment, Private EG had contact lenses in both eyes. Being the nice guy that he is, our doctor gave the soldier another chance to right himself: “Let me remind you that you are speaking with an officer. Please tell me about your contact lens use over the past month.”

“I have not worn any contact lenses over the past month, sir.”

The Optometry Clinic Non-Commissioned Officer, along with the patient’s accompanying NCO, were then asked to report to the exam lane, where the patient was again asked if he had been wearing contact lenses. He again denied it. Our optometrist then calmly explained to the errant soldier that contacts were in his eyes right now. The patient stated that this was impossible, that the lenses were in his contact lens case.

At this point, our optometrist, who is apparently a much more patient man than I, removed the contact lenses in front of the two NCOs, and had both of them verify the presence of the lenses. At this point the soldier’s NCO looked ready to strangle him. The patient indicated that “I don’t know how they got in there.” He was put on antibiotics and asked to return to the clinic the next day, with his company commander present. He was then escorted from the clinic by his NCO, who looked about ready to strangle him.

—————

My optometrist and I have debated a bit amongst ourselves as to the motives of PVT Eyegoo. So far, we have two operative theories:

1. Private EG truly did not know the contacts were in his eyes. Perhaps he put them in a long time ago, and simply forgot about them. This would explain his willingness to be seen by an optometrist, where any reasonable person would know that the contacts would be instantly discovered.
2. Private EG is not a reasonable person, and thought that the presence of contact lenses would somehow go un-noticed by our optometrist as he examined him under the slit lamp. It may seem incredible to you, but having lived here for six months, I have seen how blatant misinformation is often quickly believed all-too-willing servicemembers. I can easily imagine that a buddy of PVT EG told him how “no one can prove that you have contacts in, not even an eye doctor.”

Either way, I don’t really want this guy walking around Al Asad carrying a weapon, and I am happy to report that he has been relieved of his M-16.