Has any body cured from Lasik induced dry eyes ?

[Praveen]

Hi Everyone,
I have been a silent reader of this site for few days. I have seen so many people here with whom I can relate. I appreciate everyone's effort to support other people during their hard time.

Let'e me share my story. I am 28 year male living in North Carolina. I had my Lasik procedure done in Feb,2011 in both eyes. After that for 2 weeks I had some obvious problems like dry eyes, light sensitivity etc. But later situation got better and after 1 month I was normal. I kept putting drops for 3 months and then stopped. But After almost 5 months, one night I woke up with dry eyes and next day I took appointment with my eye doctor. He declared me as dry eye and gave me night gel and eye drops.
I saw him after 3 weeks and he said he can not see any dry eyes spot in my eyes. But I see no improvements in my symptoms. After that I consulted with a Lasik surgeon and he also did not see any dry eyes signs. But with me condition is same. I can go through the day without much difficulty. I am not saying I am 100% ok, but yes 90%. I stating feeling heavy eyes, burnness and sometime pain during evening. Nights are the toughest. I am on restasis 2X day and use refresh drops during day. Before bedtime I use Genteal Gel and have to wake up 2-3 times during sleep to reapply. I haven't had a single night when I hadn't not had to reapply the gel. It is very disturbing and depressing and in morning I feel off mood because of lack of sleep.


After reading other people stories ( I feel so sad for everybody including me), I am going in depression. I can not imagine my whole life like this ( or worst, I guess with age it will).I am only 28. I am so sorry for being so depressed but I can not help myself. It will take some time for me to accept it.

I am here to see what you guys think about my condition. Is there anybody who got lasik dry eyes after some month and got cured? How many chances I have to overcome this situation?

I would like to thank Rebecca for setting up this forum. It is giving me support and hope.

[Trac]

I have never had lasik, but I have sever dry eyes. I use FML, prescription steroids, and muro 128 ointment at night. It is the only way I can open my eyes in the morning, otherwise the eyeball sticks to the eye lid. I use to use Restatis 2 X daily and refresh drops along with muro 128 (5%) drops. It really was not helping that much. I now use serum (blood) tears, mucomyst (to break up my filaments) and I have increased my restatis to up to 4 times a day. I feel better; I would not say normal, but better than the worse they have been I tore my cornea once because my eyes were so dry. Oh, I also have all 4 tear ducts plugged and I wear eye moisture chamber goggles all of the time.

I hope this helps.

[Praveen]

Thanks Trac for the reply
I am very new to dry eyes and just started looking for possible treatments. I am going to meet one optometrist in Charlotte,NC area next week. I want a proper diagnosis of my problem. Have been to 3 doctors already 2 opthamologist and 1 lasik surgeon. But nobody even felt necessity to find out the cause of problem. This is really upsetting me. They just gave me eye drops and gel for night. I kept saying please check by tear volume and TFBT ( it is all I knew at that time.. ha ha) , but I guess I was just wasting my energy. This time I am going to see Dr Sandra Brown. I hope I find answers to my questions.

By my initial post, I am looking for hope that It can be cured. Till now what I learnt that dry eyes are for life long, sending me in more depression. I am wondering is there anybody or who knows somebody else , got this problem and later came out of this. If anybody knows, it will really give me a boost and hope.
I would really appreciate any such comment.

I pray to God to let us all feel normal eyes again.

[lizibet]

Praveen, sorry to hear how you are suffering. I had lasik in March 2008 and a fully recognise what you are going through, the pain and depression ......... I am now in a place where I can cope with the help of the various supplements and drops that we all use here. My turning point was about 18 months ago when my doctor suggested a 10mg dose of amitriptyline taken at night. This helped me to sleep through the pain that would normally wake me up. Getting a good nights sleep was key for me to deal with everything else, can't emphasis enough what this did for me.

I don't take it now, except on the odd occasion. My lasik surgeon and every other specialist I saw never diagnosed dry eye, calling it neuropathic pain. You are very young (I am much older) and I feel sure you will improve much more yet. I feel my corneas have healed more in the last 12 months, again I feel is due to sleeping better. Good luck and keep positive. Liz

[Praveen]

Thanks lizibet. It gives me hope that some recovery is still on the way ahead.

I am here to share some good moments I had with you all. My eye dry problem started 1 month back. Since my problem started I was not able to have a complete night sleep with out waking up in the middle of sleep. But yesterday I had such a night. I was scared, will I be able to sleep again like before. I applied Genteal gel and slept till morning. When I woke up my eyes felt fresh and good. Funny.... I again tried to sleep and felt dryness after 1:30 hr of sleep.
But I am really happy and hoping that it is a sign of improvements not a temporary relief.

What do you guys think, it is a improvement sign or I am hoping too much

[Trac]

Did you put the same amount of ointment in each night? I know with clear ointment I have a hard time telling how much ointment I put in.

[Praveen]

Yes, In past days I tried to put more gel , but did not work. If I am not wrong, I put the normal amount like every day. Tonight is going to be real test for it. I hope it is not a one day thing.

[Trac]

I now have to use two ointments at night, FML and muro. If I just use one, it does not seem to help.

Good luck.