While eyeball stitches might sound like one of the worst things in the world, they actually look kind of awesome.
The incredible image above was uploaded back in 2012 by redditor Philawesomeraptor, whose girlfriend had recently received a corneal transplant to treat degenerative eye disease.
Corneal transplants are the most common forms of human transplant surgery, and although they look brutal, they also have the highest success rate - and are relatively painless, aside from some scratchiness in the first few days following surgery.
You can see a rough breakdown of the procedure below, via the Surgery Encyclopaedia.
The nylon sutures holding the new cornea in place are incredibly tiny - only 22 microns thick, or one-third the width of human hair - and are often left in place for six months, but can sometimes be kept in for up to two years.
Science is amazing.
Sources: reddit, Geekologie