Towards evidence-based emergency medicine: best BETs from the Manchester Royal Infirmary. BET 3: In suspected corneal foreign body should local anaesthetic be applied before or after eye examination?

A short cut review was carried out to establish whether local anaesthetic should be instilled before or after eye examination in suspected corneal foreign body. 83 papers were found in Medline, Embase and the Cochrane Library using the reported searches, but none presented any evidence to answer the clinical question. It is concluded that there is no evidence to guide the time of installation and that local advice should be followed.