Another Freshkote question

[dryeyetoo]

Hi folks, I've been reading about Freshkote, and am thinking about asking my doc for this. I've got STT's = 0 in both eyes; lost all basal tears, and am losing reflex tears now too in the past few days, which have made my eyes feel much worse. Not sure what my TBUT is.

Was using Lacriserts, along with OTC drops; have not tried Restasis yet. In the past few days, even the Lacriserts don't seem to work very well; it's almost like my eyes are too dry for them to dissolve properly or something, even though I've been putting drops in too.

My question about Freshkote is: when using these drops 4-6 times a day (as their website said), can I still use other OTC drops in between? Or is that going to wash away the Freshkote and any beneficial effects? I've been using Optive Refresh preservative free every 3-5 minutes, and I can't imagine limiting myself to only 4-6 times a day.

Thanks!

[Rebecca Petris]

My question about Freshkote is: when using these drops 4-6 times a day (as their website said), can I still use other OTC drops in between?

You can but the less you use of other things the more benefit you're likely to have from the FreshKote. On balance though I would think you'd benefit from adding FreshKote even if you don't change much.

HOWEVER:

I've been using Optive Refresh preservative free every 3-5 minutes, and I can't imagine limiting myself to only 4-6 times a day.

No matter what drop you're using, I think that's really bad for you. That's not about lubrication - that's about pain control (or what I think of as 'sensation management'), and it is not good for the ocular surface health in general so I would suggest you look into some alternative ways of dealing with pain in order to start scaling back your drops to the actual need for lubrication. You might want to have a look at some of the threads here from people who have tried to deal with the over-dropping regimen.

One of the best tools for doing that is moisture chamber glasses. Benefits vary with the individual but for a lot of people they can make all the difference. You don't have to go from every 5 minutes to 5 times a day all at once - you can take it in stages, try spacing it to 15 minutes, then 30, then 60.

[dryeyetoo]

Thanks for responding. I suspect you're right about it not being good for my eyes. It's apparent that nothing takes the place of natural tears. It doesn't feel that great, but I thought it was better than the alternative. Although pain and discomfort is an issue, I've been doing it more to try and keep my eyes moist. I notice if I cut back they start getting red, and I figured that was not a good thing. I also thought the constant rinsing would help keep infection down. And I figured it was simply healthier than them being dessicated, even if it wasn't the best alternative.

At night I've been using mineral oil and waking up two or three times to put the drops in. In the morning, they feel and look much better, and I can go an hour or so without needing more drops.

If OTC drops aren't good for my eyes, I wonder about the Lacriserts? These are supposed to provide continual lubrication, although again, lately, now that I'm losing reflex tears also, it feels like they're not working as well.

I'll look into the moisture chamber glasses. This all happened pretty fast for me, and the changes are happening fast too. This is truly a miserable and life altering condition, and is occurring on top of some other miserable and life altering conditions, so it will probably take me a while to figure out how to live with all of this.

Thanks again!