On shipboard, he found that he actually could not walk. He kept his left eye covered by a shade on account of headache that would follow exposure to light. He was much excited and had bad nightmares.
After the journey home from the Dardanelles, it was found that the left eye was normal except for the hypermetropia, despite the fact that he was quite unable to see with the eye.
He was hypnotized four times, losing the nightmares and much of the headache after the first treatment; the eye pain on exposure to light, after the second treatment; and the blindness, after the third treatment. He was now able to see with his left eye as well as before he was struck. He was still unable to walk without crutches. Hypnotized the fourth time, he was told he could walk, and did so.
For hypnotic treatment of blindness, see under [Case 521]. Re blindness of eye already poor, see [Cases 294-301] ([296] and [297] eye cases). Ormond states that in the treatment of Shell-shock blindness, he first tried rest, tonics, cutting off tobacco, confinement in bed, isolation, persuasion, encouragement, counter-irritation; but that all these measures failed. Suggestion and hypnosis succeeded.
Shell explosion; concussion; retinal hemorrhage: Blindness. Cure by hypnosis.
Case 538. (Hurst, November, 1916.)
An English private, 22, was looking over a parapet, July 18, 1915. He afterward remembered sand thrown in his eyes and a fall backward, hitting his head, after a shell had struck the sandbags in front of him. He was unconscious 24 hours. Upon recovery, he found himself completely blind, save that he could just tell light from darkness with the left eye. His eyes were sore and eyelids blackened; there was also severe headache and partial deafness.
Hearing returned and the headache improved shortly; but the condition of the eye seemed more permanent. On forcibly opening the eyes, September 14, they were turned far upwards so that the iris could scarcely be seen. Some sand grains were buried in the conjunctiva, not in the cornea. There was no inflammation about the sand grains.
In hypnosis, he was told that he would see on waking. The moment he woke, this suggestion was repeated forcibly and his eyes were held open. He cried out that he could see; tears ran down his cheeks; he fell on his knees in gratitude. Three days later, he said he was able to see as well as he had ever seen. There was, however, an opacity of the vitreous of the left eye, the result of a retinal hemorrhage: doubtless the result of injury at the time of the explosion. September 30, he had perfect vision in the right eye and 6/36 in his left.