Hi *new user* scleral lens question

[bella]

Hi everyone, I'm new to the forum. I have severe dry eyes due to hardly producing any tears. I'm about to try scleral contact lenses at the end of this month (not the boston ones, but through my opthamology center, which is UIC eye and ear infirmary) I'm just wondering if I can get any feedback from people with sclerals who also have very low tear production like me...has it helped you, do you feel better, and how often do you need to put your tear drops in with them in? Also, I'm very sensitive and can only use preservative-free tears, do you have to put a lens solution in the lenses or can you just put your regular tears or if you do have to put a lens solution with the tears, is there a brand without perservatives that works well and isn't going to irritate?

I'm very excited and just really hoping that this lens works for me, as I'm having such problems trying to find the right balance for me, I have bottom punctal plugs, but if I put the top ones in, I have more comfort and less use of drops but my eyes run then sometimes especially if irritated, and it's very embarrasing and uncomfortable for me, but then again so is stopping all the time to put drops in and hardly being able to do things I enjoy doing, and everything else that goes with this condition...work is terrible too-working on a computer, under crazy bright lights, with vents closeby really does not help and co-workers not really understanding and giving you a hard time adding stress to the mix just doesn't help!

Thanks and hope everyone has a nice Mother's Day!
Bella

[heidi_vaz52]

Sclerals

Bella, congratulations on getting fitted for your sclerals. I recently got mine from Boston in April 09, and so glad I did.

Like yourself, I suffer from severe dry eyes with Zero tear production. Plugs nor cautherization helped.

Since using the scleral lens, it has helped me tremendously with the dryness and light sensitivity.

To answer some of your questions, I wear my sclerals from morning to night without having to rewet them. The solution I use in the lens is the celluvisc which is preservative free. I find that when I used other solutions, I was getting haziness a couple of hours after inserting them.

I wish you the best with your new sclerals. I am curious to know how you are doing with them.

Heidi

[lowcarbdoc]

scleral lens

I went to a third eye doctor on Monday. He said that he cannot predict how fast or how much my cornea of if it will continue to erode away and he suggested sclerals or hybrids. (He implied that ultimately I would probably need a transplant) Needless to say, I was bummed. He did give me a referral to a place in Oak Lawn Illinois, Davis Eyecare. I'm hopeful that something will help. He doesn't carry the Boston ones but a brand called SynergEye. Anyone have experience with this brand. From what I read it doesn't appear to have the "well" for the tears as the Boston does.



I woke up at 3:00 am with terrible pain-if I take pain pills (opiates) I can't work and I know that I need to try to preserve and heal the cornea that I have. I am wearing the onion goggles during the day and they do help (get a lot of looks but its better than being in pain) and the hospital I work in is dry and has a strong air current most locations, bright lights, lots of computer use etc. I'm so happy I found this site, its been very helpful.

Paulette

[Lucy]

Paulette, you can sometimes find "fashion glasses" at a mall boutique or a Sunglasses Hut. I think the ones with a gradient tint are really sharp. Wearing "something" over the eyes is the best way to keep your tears in. If you do not wear RX glasses, try the fashion glasses. You might not look so obvious.

Something that keeps me sane (or nearly so) is my Panoptx goggles. They have the foam eyecups and I had them made with my RX and they have Transition lens so they change to sunglasses when I'm outdoors. They don't look too cool when I'm inside, but out walking etc. look very normal.

Lucy

[parchedpeepers]

Hello..new user today June 25 2009

Hello to you all, My dry eyes just became severe the last couple weeks. I have never signed in to any website for any subject before . I have to say just reading your comments has helped my emotional state which is very bad at this point. I can't go out , and have missed work and need to return quickly, People don't understand so I try to keep quiet about the subject. So I need to start trying to get help for this. Tomorrow I go to an eye doctor, hopefully he can give me something to help. I need to log off now because of the pain in my eyes. Sorry about all the complaining. I am usually an optimistic person and lastly thank you so much for this Dry Eye Talk. It is good to know there are others who understand. thanks, stephanie

[Stanza]

hey stephanie, welcome, hope to see you around and hope the appointment gave you some ideas.

[Sabrina]

scerals

I have a question for those of you that wear scerals. Did you wear contacs previously? I have never been able to tolerate contacs so I'm skeptical of anything (other than drop) that goes in the eye. Restasis made my lids swell and made my eyes feel worse and plugs did nothing. I am doing better this last few days on Doxy which helped in the past as well but just wanting to know about options in case the Doxy stops working.

[Rebecca Petris]

I wear sclerals.

I wore soft contacts for twenty years. Then I got LASIK, and have had dry eye for 8 years. I couldn't possibly tolerate soft or normal hard lenses now. I wore 14.5mm specially designed gas perms for a couple of years and then due to dryness moved up to sclerals. To me personally, sclerals have drawbacks (after all they are a big foreign object in the eye) but can't be compared to regular contacts in terms of tolerance etc.