Eyes

A 19-month layoff hasn't changed this about Israel Vazquez: When he senses urgency, he's at his best. One round after a ringside physician inspected a troubling cut over his left eyebrow, and struggling through a ring-rusted performance, Vazquez rallied to knock down Angel Priolo three times in the ninth round before referee Pat Russell stopped the featherweight fight at the 2:10 mark Saturday at downtown L.A.'s Nokia Theatre. With his cut worsening and two judges scoring the fight even, Vazquez (44-4, 33 knockouts)

If the eyes are the windows into the soul, then Kevin Carter has the power to draw the blinds. As a special effects contact lens painter, he can create everything from cataract-ridden eyes to the supernatural peepers of the living dead. Raised in Medford, Ore., and Sonoma, Calif., Carter got hooked on horror films early on. "I loved the 'Friday the 13th' movies and Freddy Krueger in 'A Nightmare on Elm Street' and stuff like that," he recalls.

TO most of us, tears are those wet, salty drops that come out of our eyes when we cry. To scientists who study them, they're those wet, salty, oily, mucous, protein-filled drops that lubricate our eyes and protect them from dust, debris and infection. For the most part, tears go unnoticed -- until something goes wrong. Eyes sting, burn, itch or turn red. They feel like they're full of sand or being poked with a stick.

The product: Eye supplements are a hot topic of conversation in Kerry Beebe's optometry office in Brainerd, Minn., right up there with the weather and Frances McDormand trivia. "We field questions about vitamins multiple times a day," says Beebe, chairman of the Clinical Care Group for the American Optometric Assn. Patients mainly want to know if vitamins can help save them from macular degeneration, the leading cause of severe vision loss in America.

It has been more than three years since American consumers received the right to get cheaper contact lenses, but word has been slow to spread. Since 2004, federal law has dictated that your eye doctor must automatically give you your prescription after he or she fits you for contact lenses. Doctors can't charge for it or make you sign a waiver. The point of the law, called the Fairness to Contact Lens Consumers Act, is to break the domination of eye-care practitioners selling lenses.

Impotence drugs such as Viagra and Cialis can increase the risk of eye damage in men who have a history of heart disease or high blood pressure, researchers reported Tuesday in the British Journal of Ophthalmology. In a small study, scientists at the University of Alabama in Birmingham found that men who had suffered a heart attack were 10 times more likely to have a form of optic nerve damage called nonarteritic anterior ischemic optic neuropathy if they had been taking anti-impotence pills.

One day after Mighty Duck prospect Jordan Smith was struck by a deflected puck during a minor-league game and lost the sight in his left eye, Duck forward Joffrey Lupul attached a visor to his helmet. Lupul wore it in practice for a few days and didn't use it in his first game after the Olympic break, but he has worn it every game since. And he has come to believe that every NHL player should wear one. "I always said, 'It's the player's choice. It's the player's choice.'

Life for Jordan Smith changed in an instant and without warning. Smith, a second-round draft pick of the Mighty Ducks two years ago, was playing for the Portland Pirates in an American Hockey League game Feb. 24. A hard-nosed defenseman, Smith was protecting the Pirate net. Then it happened. A deflected puck on a routine shot slammed into the 20-year-old's face. The injury was not routine, his left eye severely lacerated and the orbital bone shattered.

On April 13 Bausch & Lomb asked retailers to temporarily halt sales of its ReNu With MoistureLoc contact lens solution. The announcement came after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that it was investigating 109 suspected or confirmed cases of Fusarium keratitis, occurring over 10 months. (Since then, the number has risen to 176.) Fusarium keratitis is a potentially serious infection of the cornea.

Few women appear to be aware that dry eye is a common symptom of menopause. A survey sponsored by the Society for Women's Health Research and released last month found that 62% of menopausal and peri-menopausal women report experiencing dry eye symptoms. But only 16% knew that the condition was linked to menopause. Treatments, which depend on the cause and the severity of the condition, can include artificial tear eyedrops, prescription therapies and surgery.