anyone else not feel any different on autologus serum drops?

[jenny2008]

i cant decide whether to continue these drops or not.. my doc isnt much help.. he doesnt think they help many people... i havent noticed a difference between the 20% to 50%.. and am unsure as to continue.

i was curious if anybody has tried these drops and they didnt feel any difference in their eyes??
i hope someone can help.thanks...

[PotatoCakes]

Sometimes I don't but my doctors have seen the improvement and I have felt it before. For me, it really depends a lot on how often & how I'm using them (sometimes I cheat and don't leave my eyes closed for 2 minutes or don't use it at least 6x per day). It also depends on the weather and what's going on in my life. If I'm spending a lot of time on the computer or it's winter (wind/dry/heat/cold/etc), it doesn't matter if I'm using the drops or not -- I mean, it DOES matter because the surface of my eye gets the healing benefits but the way my eyes feel still hurts due to dryness. Would they hurt more if I stopped taking them? I don't know but based on how bad my eyes were prior to using Serum Drops, I'm guessing even when they are super dry now, I'm getting benefits. Have you tried consulting with another doctor? One who does believe that serum drops help? If you see a doctor who does like them and believe in them, and he/she thinks you aren't getting any benefit, then you probably aren't. If he/she's unsure, then it's up to you.

It does seem to me that you don't WANT to take them because you ask about them a lot in ways that imply you aren't getting any benefit. That's not bad but, if you really don't want to take them (too expensive and unsure about benefits, a huge pain to obtain them, etc, etc), then maybe it's not worth it. If it's your doctor that is making you unsure (completely reasonable -- even drs we don't like have a huge influence over us emotionally, I know that from experience), then maybe your best bet at this point is another opinion.

I think it's completely reasonable to be unsure about something, particularly in the beginning but, it seems like you've had the same fears (not really right word but I couldn't think of anything else) for quite a while now. I'm just trying to figure out what the root of it is -- because that might hold the answer for you, whether you stay on them or stop or whether you stay with your doctor or try a new one.

[jenny2008]

thanks.. its hard for me cause my doc isnt a big believer in them.. he is letting me try them because i wanted to... do u use 50 or 1-00%??? i dont mind them. i may go aheAD and ask for 100% and give it another 3 months and see.. its just my right eye is soooo dry and in pain all the time and left not bad-so its a sjogrens thing.. and my mgd is about the same as always..

i have tried other docs and there is only 1 doc in town who prescribes them regularly.. and he only prescribes the 20% adn doesnt believe in expressing hte meibomian glands so i dont want to go back to him.. i cant go from one doc to another too much while on medicare...

[PotatoCakes]

I was on 50% and then switched to 75. The 50% worked very well though. I only upped my percentage because I was getting so many bottles I was afraid they weren't going to be as effective.
Remember, the drops won't prevent dryness and they won't necessarily help with pain. They help heal surface damage, the kind of damage your eyelid can cause when scraping over your dry eyeball. The reason they make my eyes feel better is the damage that I had, healed because of the drops. If I wasn't prone to that damage, the drops probably wouldn't make as much of a difference in my life, at least no more than regular preservative free tears. Another benefit, they seem to keep my eyes whiter; I can always tell when I haven't been using them enough because my eyes are a lot redder.

[PotatoCakes]

oh, and try not to let your doctor get you down. I know that's hard but since you don't have a lot of options regarding physicians, you need to be stronger than your doctor. There is a lot of scientific evidence that serum drops work and a number of top research institutions believe in them.

I've never had expression so I don't know how to weigh drops against expression but if you need or want both, go with the doctor that gives you the best of what he will.
Your doctor doesn't have to believe in serum drops if you do. Check out some of the research; there's quite a bit online and a number of links on this site.

One thing to consider, even if they aren't doing much, they do resemble your real, biological tears more than anything else out there that can be manufactured. If you do have any allergies, serum drops are a lot less likely to cause allergic reactions than synthetic drops because they are made, in part, from you. That alone, to me, is worth something, particularly since not all synthetic drops are effective or comfortable for me.

Ultimately, though, it's a decision you're going to have to make. Just because they help me, doesn't mean they help you, and I do believe that while they do physically help me, part of their effectiveness is also mental. I believe they help and that helps me, even if it doesn't technically help my eyes.

[farmgirl]

quote
Remember, the drops won't prevent dryness and they won't necessarily help with pain. They help heal surface damage, the kind of damage your eyelid can cause when scraping over your dry eyeball. The reason they make my eyes feel better is the damage that I had, healed because of the drops. If I wasn't prone to that damage, the drops probably wouldn't make as much of a difference in my life, at least no more than regular preservative free tears.

I'm with potatocakes here. Ever since I started with the serum drops I have not had corneal abrasions (or dry spots on my cornea as they were described to me). Do you not get them? and if so have the serum drops not helped with that? Without exception every time my eyes were examined post serum I was told I had spots, without exception in the year that I have been on them I have always been told my corneas are healthy. That to me is worth it's weight in wildcats. I still have dryness that has not changed, they can still get sore, gritty and sometimes burn and although that has improved it is still an issue, but my corneas are consistently pronounced healthy. Maybe you are looking for something that is not going to happen and overlooking the most important thing, the health of your corneas. Perhaps your corneas have always been pronounced healthy and you don't get corneal abrasions which could explain why you don't notice any changes....F/G