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Hi Everyone!
My name is Keira and I had Lasik Surgery 7 months ago in the UK.
The first month after the surgery was completely fine, no dry eye, no pain. Then suddenly I started to develop severe dry eyes, which eventually led to a corneal abrasion in my left eye. The abrasion has healed, but for the last 6 months I've been incredibly anxious about everything to do with my eyes.
Thankfully, I managed to be seen by a Professor within the NHS Southampton Eye Unit. He prescribed me with Autologous Serum Drops. With the way it works in the UK, there's a long wait for these drops so had to wait 3 months before I got them. I appreciate that these drops are incredibly hard to get after reading some of the posts on here, so I'm incredibly thankful to the NHS!
I've been taking the drops for the last three weeks and since then things have gone downhill. My eyes are aching especially my left eye, sometimes it feels like there's a pressure there which is hard to describe. Sometime my eyes are tingly. The worst side effect though is that I've started to wake up at 3am in the morning over the last 2 weeks with my left eye sticking to my lid. I carefully manage to put in a eye drop that solves it, but then I can't get back to sleep which is really affecting my mental state, I LOVE my sleep! I've tried ointments and gels, which don't work. So no idea why this has suddenly cropped up!
I saw the Professor again yesterday, who said my dry eyes had greatly improved (TBUT 1 second 4 weeks ago, now TBUT 8 Seconds) and that he suspects that I have corneal neuralgia through the nerve damage created by the LASIK. He said that he thinks the nerves are healing due to the up and down nature of my eyes over the last 3 weeks with the serum drops. We've scheduled in a confocal in 6 weeks time to take pictures of my nerves to see what's happening. I did question him on an Amniotic Membrane Lens (PROKERA US, Omnilenz UK). He did say this would help as it encourages nerve growth, however it wouldn't be available for myself on the NHS as they only use this in serious cases (corneal ulcers, burns victims). I'm currently investigating how much this would be to get privately.
There was also another Doctor at my appointment. She used to work in a Laser Eye Surgery place in the Middle East. They would prescribe Trium Eye Drops to patients and she assured me that they were a huge success, probably because they have Ginko Biloba extract in them which releases NGF. She said 3-6 months was usually the amount of time patients would see a noticeable difference. So I managed to order some from an Italian pharmacy to be sent to the UK.
Soooo I have a few questions to the amazing Dry Eye Community on here:
Thank you!
My name is Keira and I had Lasik Surgery 7 months ago in the UK.
The first month after the surgery was completely fine, no dry eye, no pain. Then suddenly I started to develop severe dry eyes, which eventually led to a corneal abrasion in my left eye. The abrasion has healed, but for the last 6 months I've been incredibly anxious about everything to do with my eyes.
Thankfully, I managed to be seen by a Professor within the NHS Southampton Eye Unit. He prescribed me with Autologous Serum Drops. With the way it works in the UK, there's a long wait for these drops so had to wait 3 months before I got them. I appreciate that these drops are incredibly hard to get after reading some of the posts on here, so I'm incredibly thankful to the NHS!
I've been taking the drops for the last three weeks and since then things have gone downhill. My eyes are aching especially my left eye, sometimes it feels like there's a pressure there which is hard to describe. Sometime my eyes are tingly. The worst side effect though is that I've started to wake up at 3am in the morning over the last 2 weeks with my left eye sticking to my lid. I carefully manage to put in a eye drop that solves it, but then I can't get back to sleep which is really affecting my mental state, I LOVE my sleep! I've tried ointments and gels, which don't work. So no idea why this has suddenly cropped up!
I saw the Professor again yesterday, who said my dry eyes had greatly improved (TBUT 1 second 4 weeks ago, now TBUT 8 Seconds) and that he suspects that I have corneal neuralgia through the nerve damage created by the LASIK. He said that he thinks the nerves are healing due to the up and down nature of my eyes over the last 3 weeks with the serum drops. We've scheduled in a confocal in 6 weeks time to take pictures of my nerves to see what's happening. I did question him on an Amniotic Membrane Lens (PROKERA US, Omnilenz UK). He did say this would help as it encourages nerve growth, however it wouldn't be available for myself on the NHS as they only use this in serious cases (corneal ulcers, burns victims). I'm currently investigating how much this would be to get privately.
There was also another Doctor at my appointment. She used to work in a Laser Eye Surgery place in the Middle East. They would prescribe Trium Eye Drops to patients and she assured me that they were a huge success, probably because they have Ginko Biloba extract in them which releases NGF. She said 3-6 months was usually the amount of time patients would see a noticeable difference. So I managed to order some from an Italian pharmacy to be sent to the UK.
Soooo I have a few questions to the amazing Dry Eye Community on here:
- Has anyone had similar sensations in their eyes after taking Autologous Serum drops? I'm currently on 50% 8x a day.
- How long did it take the Autologous Serum drops to have an effect? Did it help with nerve growth/pain?
- Has anyone had success with Prokera or Omnilenz with nerve damage after LASIK?
- Has anyone tried these Trium Eye Drops before? Any successes?
Thank you!