Need some help

[virus]

I'm new to the forum and wanted to learn. I had Intralase done Oct. 10th. I've been going through vials upon vials of preservative free drops. Depending on the brand, it's a ton. At night I've been using 2 different ointments which I will stop after reading the wonderful information on this site. Systane leaves residue on my eyelashes which leads to eye irritation. I tried Refresh Endura which burned the heck out of my eyes. Refresh Plus didn't work well the first time and I found myself using up to 10 vials a day. I settled on Bion Tears which have been good, but it's way too costly and they give you too much fluid in each vial. I went back to Refresh Plus yesterday and found it was the most comfortable for me, but again I am using at least 6 vials a day. I ran out and tonight I purchased some Refresh Celluvisc. The Celluvisc seems to last quite a long time and I have only used 1 vial in the last 2 hours and I'm still good, but it takes a while for the blurriness to wear off. Now I'm reading on the site that using too many artificial tears can actually be harmful for tear production. How do I break this habit while maintaining comfortable eyes? Any suggestions are welcomed.

[Delilah]

Warm compresses

Hello I just responded to you about Shaklee and just read your post about your eyes and I am very sorry. When one has severe dry eye you will do anything to put moisture back into them. You can ruin your natural tear production by over doing it with eye drops but if you need them you need them right? For one you need to try warm compresses on your eyes as many times as you can, this gets the oils working in your eyes. I take a wash cloth and run it under hot water and place it over my eyes, then I take and put some natural tears in and repeat. You will notice your eyes get blurry after you do this but its only because its breaking down the oils and getting them flowing in your eyes. I love the ReFresh eye drops and yes they are a bit spendy. I have MGD and Severe dry eye and along with that I have these horrible stringy mucus things coming out of my eyes day in and day out, it sucks and I've tried every kind of eye drop and method there is, Im just living with it and dealing with it. Other ways of doing the warm compresses is using a rice baggie, popping it in the microwave for a short time and them place it over your eyes, be careful not to burn yourself that is why I like the wash cloth method better. Hope this is of some help and again Welcome to the site. Ciao Delilah

[shells]

I'm confused?

Hey guys,

I'm sorry, but I'm really confused. Virus and Delilah both mentioned that using too many artificial tears can hurt your natural tear production. Is this true? Can someone explain this to me? I thought that the more artificial tears you used the better? I've been using tears alot even on my good days because I thought that they were helping my lasiked eyes to heal. All the doctors say to lubricate, lubricate, lubricate!! Can too many drops actually hurt your eyes?

Michelle

[virus]

Hey guys,

I'm sorry, but I'm really confused. Virus and Delilah both mentioned that using too many artificial tears can hurt your natural tear production. Is this true? Can someone explain this to me? I thought that the more artificial tears you used the better? I've been using tears alot even on my good days because I thought that they were helping my lasiked eyes to heal. All the doctors say to lubricate, lubricate, lubricate!! Can too many drops actually hurt your eyes?

Michelle

Basically if you overlubricate, you may be washing what your eyes are secreting. You need to find a happy medium.

This site is amazing. As mentioned before, I've been using Refresh PM ointment at night. After reading through the site, I noticed alot of people found wonderful results with GenTeal's nightime Gel. I went out last night at 9:30pm and purchased some. What a fantastic product! I think the ointment was the cause of some of my dry eye. Today I only used 2 vials of Refresh Plus. For those that have seen the size of these vials, you know how little artificial tears are in there. The Gel is alot more comfortable than the ointment to boot. I hope my eyes continue to need less artificial lubrication. Although I didn't think my eyes felt dry, I put them in because I noticed my vision slightly blurry, kinda like wearing contacts for a while. (which by the way I couldn't wear contacts for more than 2 hours because of dry eye)

[Cindy]

from Dry Eye Zone FAQs:
http://www.dryeyezone.com/faq/otcats.html

How often can I use artificial tears?

"The most important thing to know is that overusing artificial tears may make your problem worse.

Remember that in addition to lipids (oily stuff that retards evaporation), aqueous (watery stuff) and mucin (sticky stuff) there are also all kinds of other goodies in your natural tears that nourish your epithelium (eye surface). If each week you generate a small mountain of empty single-use vials thinking that because they are unpreserved they are also harmless, not only will you get tired of spending all that money but you may wash all the good stuff out of your tears — like stuff that prevents infections! If your tears are perfectly healthy, this will make them less healthy or even unhealthy. And if as is the case with most of us, you are already somewhat deficient in lipids (oily stuff), and/or have a mucin layer (sticky stuff) problem, you may make those problems even worse.

It sounds contradictory — the more tears you use, the drier you get. But think about it. If the only thing keeping your tears from evaporating faster than you can make them or supplement them is oily stuff that your eyes secrete, and you don’t even make all that much oily stuff, and you over-dilute the tears so that there’s almost no oily stuff left, what’s going to happen? They’re going to evaporate faster, ergo, your eyes will be drier. This is why some patients report that when they stopped using artificial tears altogether, they actually saw an improvement in their symptoms.

Anyway, to answer the question, if you’re using normal off-the-shelf artificial tears, please try to avoid using them more than once every couple of hours. If the only way you can keep your eyes comfortable is dosing every 15 minutes, you’re probably going to make your tear film more and more unstable. You may need to get some more effective eyedrops, and you should be looking into things like lid therapy to boost your lipid supply. If you are truly aqueous deficient, punctal plugs may be in order. Please have a look at our dry eye treatment pages for other strategies."
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[Missy]

I asked my doctor how many drops was too much and he told me that I shouldn't use them more than once an hour or so. Other than that he said that they couldn't hurt anything. If your eyes are really dry then I suggest sticking to a drop schedule. When I put my drops in every two hours or so I feel a lot more comfortable and my eyes don't seem to get as irritated. I also use ointment at night and I really like it so far. I think that it works better for some people than others though.

Missy

[virus]

Trust me, the GenTeal night time gel for severe dry eye works alot better and is alot more comfortable than ointments. Again today I only used 2 vials as opposed to the 10 or more a day that I was using. I'm not uncomfortable either like I was when using the ointment.