No-rub chug-a-lug?

January 23, 2006 7:36 PM

Would it hurt one to drink contact solution?

Not regularly, but say in an emergency situation. Google is inconclusive, and the packaging merely says not to use it if you're allergic to any of the ingredients.

The stuff I use lists ingredients as: Polyquaternium-1 (0.0011%), Sodium Citrate, Poloxamine, Sodium Lauroyl Lactylate, Sodium Chloride, Borates, Mannitol, and Edetate Disodium (0.05%).

You put it in your eyes, how bad could it be for your stomach?

posted by attercoppe to Health & Fitness (17 answers total)

It's full of salt, so I can't imagine it'd do much good if dehydration is the "emergency situation" you're talking about.
posted by mediareport at 7:44 PM on January 23, 2006

One possible resource [PDF] shows no significant danger.
posted by zek at 7:46 PM on January 23, 2006

hmmm.. offhand sodium citrate, sodium chloride (duh), and mannitol (just a sugar alcohol) all sound okay. Polyquaternium-1 is some silly trade name compound they have, isn't it? I wonder how salty it really is, it has to be somewhat isotonic otherwise it'd really burn. I wouldn't imagine it'd be any worse than gatorade, electrolytes-wise.
posted by Mercaptan at 7:49 PM on January 23, 2006

Best answer: It's (mostly) saline.

As for salt concentration - it's designed to be isotonic; will not leach nor shove water out of or into your (eye) cells.

I think it would be mostly neutral, fluids wise, if drunk.
posted by PurplePorpoise at 7:58 PM on January 23, 2006

You could drink it without ill effect, unless you were allergic to one of the ingredients.
posted by ikkyu2 at 8:08 PM on January 23, 2006

You put it in your eyes, how bad could it be for your stomach?

Well, if you were talking about Visine instead of contact lens solution, the answer would be pretty bad. Just because you can put it on your body, doesn't mean you should put it in your body.

Ths doesn't answer your question, but it was related and I thought it was interesting.
posted by MsMolly at 8:12 PM on January 23, 2006

Why?
posted by jerryg99 at 8:19 PM on January 23, 2006

"Just because you can put it on your body, doesn't mean you should put it in your body"

To nitpick, your stomach isn't really "in" your body (topologically speaking). If you think about it, both your stomach/gut and your eye have membranes that things can diffuse through--and into your body...

Doesn't change the answer though, I suppose.
posted by needs more cowbell at 8:24 PM on January 23, 2006

(Perhaps with Visine the issue is the *amount* taken into the body? Even a milliliter of eyedrops is a lot more than you'd normally put into your eye.)
posted by needs more cowbell at 8:29 PM on January 23, 2006

I was under the impression that contact solution is just saline, and that saline is just water that has the same pH as blood. So, working off that, it wouldn't hurt you at all, but it also wouldn't hydrate you because of the salt.
posted by borkingchikapa at 10:06 PM on January 23, 2006

Best answer: It's all food-grade stuff except for the sodium lauryl lactylate (soap) and Polyquaternium-1 which is a quarternary ammonium compound (antimicrobial). In these quantities I'd say you would be fine drinking a bottle of contact solution.

Also there's a few MSDS for contact solution online (e.g.) and they don't seem to indicate any ingestion hazard.
posted by rxrfrx at 5:58 AM on January 24, 2006

There's the Johnson and Johnson brand that has a very small trace of the protein deposit dissolvers included in the rinse/storage formula so that you only need to use the one solution. I imagine that drinking that might be less than healthy.
posted by Ryvar at 7:51 AM on January 24, 2006

Sorry, not Johnson & Johnson, it's Bausch & Lomb's Renu Multiplus.

From the side of the bottle . . .

CONTENTS: A sterile, isotonic solution that contains HYDRANATE (hydroxyalkylphosphonate), boric acid, edetate disodium, poloxamine, sodium borate and sodium chloride; preserved with DYMED (polaminopropyl biguanide) 0.0001%.
posted by Ryvar at 7:57 AM on January 24, 2006

sodium lauryl lactylate (soap)

Or detergent? My understanding is that the lauryls are quite bad for one's health. We just trust that they stay on our scalp (shampoo) or get spit out (toothpaste), instead of being ingested.

I may be out to lunch, though.
posted by five fresh fish at 9:25 AM on January 24, 2006

Yes, soap, detergent. It can be an irritant in large quantities, and can form dangerous compounds through reaction with a variety of stuff, but eating a little isn't going to kill you, just as getting a mouthful of soapy water by accident (or swallowing some toothpaste) isn't anything to be concerned about.
posted by rxrfrx at 10:51 AM on January 24, 2006

There's a huge difference between soap and detergent. Soap, I wouldn't worry overly about ingesting; detergent, another story entirely.
posted by five fresh fish at 10:41 AM on January 25, 2006

There's a huge difference between soap and detergent.

Please explain. I use "soap" as a colloquial equivalent to the more scientific "detergent," though I usually use it to refer to the most common kinds of household detergent, sodium alkyl sulfates.
posted by rxrfrx at 11:10 AM on January 25, 2006