3 Tools To Help with Dry Eye Disease
Do your eyes feel dry? Do they ache or burn or itch? Does it feel like you have a “gravel” sensation that comes and goes? Does your vision seem to get blurrier as the day goes on? Or maybe your vision seems clearest right after you blink? Now, most people at some time or another could answer “yes” to these questions. But there are many individuals out there who unfortunately suffer from these symptoms daily, even to the point where their poor eyes always feel uncomfortable.
Although multiple eye conditions can play a role in these symptoms, the most common cause of all these symptoms is called ocular surface disease (OSD). OSD is a blanket term for eye conditions that affect the surface of the eyeball. What you see when you look in the mirror at your eye: your eyelids, eyelashes, sclera (the white part of your eye), conjunctiva (the transparent membrane you can’t see on top of the sclera), and one of the most sensitive structures on our whole body, the cornea (the clear structure that is in front of the colored part of your eye (iris).
Of all the ocular surface diseases out there, the most common type is Dry Eye Disease (DED), which affects as many as 50 million Americans every year. There are a wide array of causes of DED and those causes can have connections to other systemic issues happening in the body. There are two major types of DED. The first and most common is evaporative DED. This is where our tear film doesn’t last as long as it should between our blink and the tears evaporate too quickly. The other is called Aqueous-Deficient DED. This is where our lacrimal gland (our tear-making gland located behind the corner of our eyebrow) doesn’t produce enough tears or in some cases too many low-quality tears. Most DED sufferers have a combination of these two types.
There are far too many causes and effective treatment options for those causes, to cover in this short article. But some easy at-home treatments tend to help across the DED spectrum. I will recommend three high-yield simple treatments that can serve as a starting point for finding some relief to the discomfort produced by DED. These recommendations are based on what I see most commonly every day in our OSD/DED clinic at ABSee Vision Care.
Our eyes are constantly being coated with a special mixture of oil, immune modulators, and enzymes. This coating is called the tear film and it has 3 key layers: The superficial lipid (oil) layer, and the aqueous and mucin layer. These components of the tear film come from different sources. The lipid layer is supplied mainly by oil-producing glands in our eyelids called meibomian glands. When these glands function properly, our blinking causes them to pump lubricating and clearing meibum (good oil) into our tears and onto our eyes. However, in many people, these glands are plugged up from debris, dead skin cells, and old solidified oil. This blockage can be improved and sometimes reversed with the right tools.
Tool one
A nightly warm compress. The best way to improve the functioning of these oil glands is through heat. Using an eye-specific microwavable heat mask (one that holds heat for at least 8-10 minutes is ideal). A brand called Bruder makes a good one and 20 seconds in the microwave is usually enough heat and then rest that heat mask on your closed eyes nightly. After about 2 weeks, you’ll usually notice an improvement in how your eyes feel. Your vision may even be a little murky right after using the mask. Don’t worry, that’s just the oil that has been blocked up (think of liquifying solid butter).
Tool two
An “oil-based” preservative-free artificial tear. Supplementing our oil from an outside source, while we work on improving our eye oil gland health with the heat mask can be very helpful in getting faster relief. Many artificial tear brands make an “evaporative dry eye” drop. I’ll list a few of my favorites (all of the following should be used at least 4 times a day and say “preservative free” on the label): Systane Complete, Refresh Mega, Retaine MGD, Soothe XP, and iVizia.
Tool three
Drinking enough water. This one sounds simple, but many of my dry eye sufferers are surprised when they start monitoring their water intake and find that it is very low. The recommended range depends on the person, but a good goal for DED sufferers is between 64-100 ounces of water daily. There are also “Dry Eye Drink” mixes now available that I have seen be particularly helpful in DED that have an autoimmune origin/component (Rheumatoid Arthritis and Sjogren’s Syndrome sufferers for example.) Bruder also makes a quality version of this drink mix that I would recommend.
Now, if these tools don’t yield much improvement in how your eyes are feeling after about two weeks of consistent use, I recommend that you get a dry eye evaluation from a dry eye and ocular surface disease specialist such as myself. During these evaluations, we use state-of-the-art measuring equipment and thorough eye examinations to determine the sources of your eye issues and create customized treatment plans and systems to fix your eyes. There is relief out there for your achy dry eyes, but usually, the first step is identifying the cause so the treatment can be tailored appropriately.