Historically, the workplace was the site of the majority of eye injuries. While the trends have changed — now, nearly half of all eye injuries each year occur in the home — it is true that the workplace can still present many threats to sight. Eye injuries on the job often require one or more missed work days to recover from and may cause temporary or permanent vision loss.

The most important thing you can do to protect your vision on the job is to always wear appropriate protective eyewear, which can prevent more than 90 percent of serious eye injuries.

What to Look Out For

Common causes for eye injuries are:

• Flying objects (bits of metal, glass);
• Tools;
• Particles;
• Chemicals;
• Any combination of these or other hazards.

Protecting Your Eyes

There are three things you can do to help prevent an eye injury:

• Know the eye safety dangers at work.
• Eliminate hazards before starting work. Use machine guarding, work screens or other engineering controls.
• Use proper eye protection.

Wear protective eyewear whenever there is a chance of eye injury. Anyone working in or passing through areas that pose eye hazards should wear protective eyewear. This is particularly true of workers involved in welding, which poses a high risk of on-the-job eye injury, according to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission.

The type of safety eye protection needed depends on the hazards in your workplace and should be compliant with OSHA regulations for eye and face protection. If you are working in an area that has particles, flying objects or dust, you must at least wear safety glasses with side protection (side shields). If you are working with chemicals, you should wear goggles. If you are working near hazardous radiation (welding, lasers or fiber optics) you must use special-purpose safety glasses, goggles, face shields or helmets designed for that task.

Always be sure your eye safety wear is OSHA-compliant has been approved by ANSI and remind colleagues to be EyeSmart on the job.

If an eye injury occurs:
See an ophthalmologist or go to the emergency room immediately, even if the eye injury appears minor. Delaying medical attention can result in permanent vision loss or blindness.

>>Learn how to recognize an eye injury.