What Causes Subconjunctival Hemorrhage?

Posted on Wed, 11 Jun 2014

Medically reviewed by Ask A Doctor - 24x7 Medical Review Team

Wed, 11 Jun 2014 Answered on

Mon, 30 Jun 2014 Last reviewed on

Question : brother woke up in morning with eye glued shut. Found out that his eye was full of blood and he had a large knot on his forehead. He is a trucker and was sleeping in his truck alone. when he went into truck stop people thought that he had been shot in the head. He has no idea how this happened or what caused it. He checked his bed area to see if something could have fallen on him but he could not find anything that would have caused it.

Answered by Dr. Dadapeer K (55 minutes later)

Brief Answer:
It seems like subconjunctival hemorrhage.

Detailed Answer:
Hello sir,
Welcome to Health care magic

I am Dr. Dadapeer K, an Ophthalmologist and I answer XXXXXXX problems related to eye.

It seems from the history that your brother is having blood in the eye with a knot on the forehead. This indicates collection of blood in the eye under the conjunctiva called as subconjunctival hemorrhage. This occurs as a result of injury or rubbing of the eyes or even after sleeping with eyes open against a pillow. This condition will resolve over 1-2 weeks by itself as the blood gets absorbed slowly and generally no treatment is required. Applying cold compression over the closed eyelids will provide symptomatic relief.

However if he is having other symptoms like pain, discharge, decrease in vision other conditions like infection of the eye have to be suspected.
If possible do send a photo of the affected eye so that I conform the diagnosis and advice more accurately.

Hope I have answered your question and the information is helpful to you.

Thank you

Above answer was peer-reviewed by : Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar