Eye allergy and a bit of dryness

[Ramon700]

Hello all,

This is my first post. Although bringing up problems may not be the best introduction , I thought I should go straight to business.

So let's get started:

My eyes have been red for like 7 months now. It doesn't itch, doesn't burn or sting or anything like that. The only things I notice are occasional dryness (not every day) and a clear/transparent discharge in the inner corner of my eyes. It's not a whole lot of a discharge, just a little bit, but enough for me to notice. I used to wear contact lenses before this problem started, but I'm not using them in this meanwhile.

I've been to different doctors and they all thought it was allergies. The first doctor told me to use some OTC decongestant+antihistamine combination for a week to see if it would improve. It didn't, so I went back there and he prescribed me Pataday, which I used for one month, without any improvements, and Optive, for my occasional dryness. Optive did improve dryness, but the redness was still there.

I went to see another doctor, which also thought it was allergies, and prescribed me Elestat, which didn't make any difference either. He also asked me to try Systane Ultra, which is better in my opinion, although it also doesn't improve the redness.

Then, I did a lab exam (eye cytology and culture), and I'm going to write here exactly how it was reported back to me (although it's translated, I'm not a native english speaker):

Cytology: Predominantly polymorphonuclear neutrophils, normal epithelial cells, rare eosinophils.
Culture: Conjunctival Sac: negative
Eyelid borders: Staphylococcus epidermidis
(my eyelids look and feel normal, I don't think I have blepharitis. Either way I'm maintaining a proper eyelid hygiene).
Conclusion: Laboratory diagnosis compatible with allergic conjunctival disease.

At first I got a bit worried about the staph thing. My doctor didn't think there was a problem there, so I went on another one to ask about this. This other doctor didn't think there was a problem either.

Since it was concluded I had allergies, my doctor prescribed me Lastacaft (alcaftadine), and he told me to use it for three months. I've been using it for almost a month already and it still pretty much the same (maybe there has been a very mild improvement). I feel like using it for more two months ain't gonna make no difference, but I'll still follow the treatment he prescribed.

I have also tried taking Voltaren (diclofenac sodium), which is a NSAID, and didn't do any good either.

I really don't know what to think. Every doctor thinks it's allergies, and even the exam suggests so, but no meds ever make any difference in the redness. I seriously don't know what else to do.

Has anyone ever been in some similar situation?

[Ramon700]

After doing a lot of research, from what I could find, predominance of neutrophils (my case) usually indicate an infection, while lots of eosinophils (not my case) indicate allergy. I'm beggining to think that all my problems could be related to this staph in my eyelids.

I've been checking on my eyelids since I made this research, and I'm not sure they are really normal. I mean, there are no crusts and they don't stick together when I wake up, but the outer corner does look a bit reddish, sometimes less, sometimes more.

Anyway, like I said, they did a culture for my conjunctival sacs, which didn't have any staph. So here is what I thought: maybe it's like the staph from my eye lids are "migrating" to my conjunctiva, so my neutrophils go there and eliminate them, what prevents the infection, but, for some reason, there are still staph in my eyelids. I'm not sure if what I said here even makes sense, but I just tend to try to understand everything :P

Please, someone, share some thoughts with me!

[spmcc]

Perhaps there are some helpful ideas in this new article on testing for ocular allergies: http://www.ophthalmologymanagement.c...ticleID=110668

[MGD666]

Very interesting read there spmcc, I would really like to undergo some of this allergy testing myself. Thank you for the link.

[spmcc]

Here's another article on eyes and allergies... http://www.revoptom.com/continuing_e...ssonid/109873/

If I could copy and paste more easily with the Ipad, I would have included some quotes. But some of the pictures (e.g. chemosis and GPC) are very interesting IMO so please check out the article.

[MGD666]

Great read there with all of those doctors' opinions and their various treatment methods. Especially interesting to me perhaps as a recent examination revealed that I had a rather pronounced case of trantas dots - a form of "Vernal Keratoconjunctivitis" underneath one of my eyelids. It was presumed that it was due to cat dander, dust mites, or both. Obviously, I need to pursue this further, and the more I read information like this, the more I feel that many other dry eye sufferers have undiagnosed allergies contributing to their problems. Thank you for posting this link too spmcc.