Sports Eye Safety Awareness Month – April 2025

History of Sports Eye Safety Awareness Month

For some, wearing eyewear while participating in sports is a tradition that dates back over a century. Some people believe that wearing eyewear while participating in sports is unnecessary. Perhaps the latter group hasn’t seen how terrible a bat to the eye in a hockey game can be, or how painful a ball to the eye in baseball can be. Nonetheless, eyewear has been in use even in ancient Egypt. Around 1200 B.C., fencers in Egypt wore masks to protect themselves. Although these masks have undergone several modifications over the centuries, their purpose remains to protect the invaluable eyes.

The American Academy of Ophthalmology has designated April as the month for raising awareness on using eye protection during sports. One of its main pieces of advice is for players of high-risk sports to wear eye protection gear — to reduce the souring number of sports-related eye injuries in the U.S.

Sports-related eye injuries can be highly detrimental to players and their careers. In 1957, baseball pitcher— Herb Score — suffered an injury to his retina and even though he recovered three weeks after the incident, he was never the same formidable pitcher he was known to be. In 1967, Tony Conigliaro — also a baseball player — suffered a retina injury on-field and despite returning to the sport two years after, his career took a downturn. The famous basketball player, Abdul-Jabbar saw the need for using eye protection after having incurred scratches to his cornea and began to wear one in 1968. In 2004, Steve Yzerman would have done otherwise if he had known that not wearing his face shield would send him to the surgery room for corneal abrasion and orbital fracture. His injury consequently advanced the push for the mandatory use of visors in hockey.