4 Ways To Treat Your Dry Eye

June 14th, 2019

Tired of itchy, red, watery eyes? These are common symptoms of dry eye. The good news is that dry eye is something you can treat!

The trick to overcoming your chronic dry eye is by treating not only its symptoms but also its causes. Here are some ways you can make your eyes healthy again.

Eye Drops

The classic way to deal with dry eye is with eye drops. These provide fast relief that can last a while.

The problem with normal eye drops is they only treat the symptoms of dry eye. Unless they are an eye drop that’s medicated, they don’t provide a permanent solution.

Eye drops are a better option than always rubbing your eyes, which is damaging!

You can get many kinds of eye drops that do different things. High viscosity eye drops are longer lasting, but cause your vision to be blurry for a few minutes.

Lower viscosity eye drops work fast, but offer fleeting relief and frequent application. Be sure to use proper eye drop application technique when using eye drops.

Change Your Living Space

Altering your habitat can go a long way in dry eye prevention. For example, adding humidifiers to your home increases the moisture.

More moisture in your home can help your eyes produce more tears. Reducing the amount of pollen and other allergens in your home can help as well!

If you know you have allergies, clean regularly! Try to use a vacuum cleaner that won’t kick up the allergens while it’s running, or use a damp cloth.

Remove Bad Habits

Certain habits exacerbate dry eye. Smoking, for instance, is bad all around! It increases your risks of developing eye conditions and smoke is irritating.

Quitting smoking is one of the best things you can do for your vision.

Computer use can also cause dry eye. When we sit in front of a screen for a long time, we forget to blink as much.

This of course causes our eyes to dry out and become irritated. Taking frequent breaks can fix this issue.

Set silent reminders every 20 minutes to take a short break from looking at your screen. Use this time to blink and put in eye drops as necessary. Your eyes will feel so much better!

Get Professional Treatment

Sometimes you can’t tackle a problem like dry eye on your own. That’s okay! At Laser Eye Center in Decatur, Alabama, we’re here to help.

You may need gland expression therapy to unclog the oil producing glands in your eyes. Oil is very important to tears, as it prevents the tears from evaporating off of the eye. The therapy is short and painless.

Punctal plugs may be the best option for you instead. Punctal plugs are inserted into your tear ducts to prevent your tears from draining.

This forces them to stay on the surface of your eye longer. Punctal plugs are easy and painless to put in, and they can also be easily removed if they aren’t working for you.

Ready to kick your dry eye symptoms to the curb? Schedule an appointment at Laser Eye Center in Huntsville, AL today!