How many IPL treatments?

[odydnas]

How many IPL treatments did you have before you start to feel an improvement? I'm not talking about a significant improvement, I'm just talking about a slight/noticeable change. It's been a week since I've had my first IPL treatment and I feel no difference at all. Not the slightest bit. I know everyone is different, and I should be patient, but I would like to get an idea. Thanks!

[painless]

During the month after my 2nd treatment, I sort of gradually realized my eyes were doing a little better. There was no dramatic change, but a subtle sense that something had improved. My eyes just seemed somehow a bit more comfortable. I wasn't positive there was improvement, but I felt like maybe there was.

When I went in for my 3rd treatment (a few weeks ago), more of my glands were functioning and my TBUT was a little bit higher. No dramatic changes in the numbers, but my TBUT was a couple of seconds higher than it had been since I was diagnosed, and enough to confirm the sense of improvement I'd had.

After my 1st treatment, I felt zero difference, even though during the exam before the 2nd treatment, more of my glands were functioning than before and there was maybe a 1 second improvement in my TBUT. Regardless of the numbers, I did not feel any difference until the subtle improvement following the 2nd treatment.

My 4th treatment is next week. During the weeks since my 3rd treatment, I have not felt any additional improvement. However, my situation is complicated by my having stopped using Azasite 2 weeks after IPL #2. I had been using it daily for a very long time and suddenly (irrationally) became worried that if the BAK in it was exacerbating my symptoms, then the IPL wouldn't be able to help as long as I was using it.

Part of what then made me think the IPL was helping, is that I was able to stop the Azasite. Previously, my eyes would become TERRIBLE within days of stopping it and I never made it more than a week before starting again. This time, my eyes showed zero effect of having stopped it through the 2 weeks from when I stopped until I had IPL #3.

However, Azasite is known to keep having an effect for a month after stopping it. That had not been the case for me before (as I said, I could barely make it a week), but my eyes have been doing worse since I passed the 1-month mark last week.

I am not going to start the Azasite again, though, until a couple of weeks after IPL #4. I want to give IPL more of a chance.

I intend to give IPL 6 chances. Immediately following my 3rd treatment, last month, I had a moment of COMPLETE COMFORT. It was stunning. It was the first time I have felt 100% comfortable eyes in literally years. It shocked me -- I hadn't even realized that I didn't remember what that felt like. It was pure comfort, not a smidge of irritation or dryness or anything. It was light years beyond anything a drop or any other treatment has been able to achieve. It only lasted a moment, in part because he immediately put the drops in so he could measure the numbers again. (Sad!) But the fact that IPL could give me a moment like that makes me believe it can help me improve further.

So my story is not necessarily an encouraging one in that I can't tell you, "I felt nothing until treatment #whatever but THEN I found success!" But, honestly, even the subtle improvement I felt during the weeks after IPL #2 was worth it to me.


To clarify, my eyes have suffered over the last week or so since the 1-month mark of stopping Azasite, but they are nowhere near as bad as they ever were before starting Azasite or the other times I tried to stop it. I attribute my ability to tolerate stopping Azasite to the IPL, as nothing else in my regimen has changed. It is also entirely possible that the flare-up over the last week is unrelated to stopping Azasite.

And further evidence (to me) of IPL's positive effect is that twice in two months I have had to wear contacts for a few hours and my eyes actually felt okay! They looked even more irritated than they already always do, but previously wearing contacts for even a couple of minutes was unbearably uncomfortable. These two times, I forgot I was wearing them.

So my eyes are not doing great, but the IPL has benefited me in small but noticeable ways.

[jimi51]

I just got my second treatment on Tuesday form Dr. Assil. While I can't say I feel any better yet, he did tell me that my Tbut was a 6 and an 7 which compared to my first visit was 1 and 2. The female Dr. who expressed my glads post IPL stated that my eye oils were like toothpaste the first time and more like butter the second, which is some kind of improvement. So, I am hoping that the signs soon lead to better symptoms but as of right now, about the same. I am on "Besiavance" (spl) as opposed to Azasite as I found Azasite too thick and it hurt my eyes even more. I use this drop twice a day for one week following IPL and they have had me on a very low dose Doxy as well. I am a post LASIK dry eye person and interestingly enough, both my regular opthomologist and my optometrist told me I had no signs of bleth but Dr. Hamilton form JSEI and Dr. Assil say for sure I do and the treatment should help some. Thanks

[lasikdryeye04]

I am a post LASIK dry eye person and interestingly enough, both my regular opthomologist and my optometrist told me I had no signs of bleth

Same as mine. I've seen 15 ophthalmologists. 12 said no sign bleph, 2 mild bleph and only 1 said severe bleph/mgd.

[jimi51]

The only thing I can hope for is that I do exhibit some signs of MGD and the treatments work! If they are saying that my oil glands secrete a toothpaste like oil, and I know it was very hard for them to express my glands, then it seems to me they are right. I don't know and whats frustrating is that they are all doing LASIK as well!