Electrical injury of the eye.

A 17-year-old male suffered superficial and deep facial burns after coming into contact with a high tension electrical cable with his head and right side of the face. The right eye sustained severe thermal coagulative injuries and subsequently was enucleated. Histopathological examination showed that the retinal neuropile was relatively intact although the retinal and choroidal circulations were severely compromised. The left eye was less affected but a dense cataract developed and required lensectomy. Visual acuity remained poor in the left eye due to retinal atrophy, retinal vascular attenuation and optic nerve degeneration. Electroretinographic tests and pseudo-random binary stimulus visually evoked responses were useful in predicting the visual outcome.