If you’ve got dry eyes, you know the symptoms: itching, gritty feeling, dryness, burning – even sometimes excessive tearing. But there are steps you can take to make your dry eyes comfortable again. What Causes Dry Eyes? Your eyes feel dry when they consistently don’t have enough lubricating tears on their surface. This is caused by:

• USING THE COMPUTER A LOT

• WEARING CONTACT LENSES

• LIVING IN AN AREA WITH HEAVY POLLUTION, WIND OR SUN

• TAKING MEDICATIONS LIKE ANTIHISTAMINES, HIGH BLOOD PRESSURE MEDICINES, DIURETICS, TRANQUILIZERS OR SLEEPING TABLETS

• BEING PREGNANT

• REFRACTIVE SURGERY

• THE AGING PROCESS—OVER TIME THE EYE MAKES LESS TEARS

What Can You Do? For many people, dry eye can be remedied by using artificial tears; eye drops designed to moisturize and comfort dry eyes.

Artificial Tear Eye drops come close to the makeup of natural tears, but in some cases there is no substitute. If you’ve been using lubricating eye drops and they don’t seem to really help, you should see us about other options.

We can help you retain the moisture in your eyes with Punctal Plugs that help you conserve the natural tears you already produce.

How Do Punctal Plugs Work? There are two little ducts called puncta in your upper and lower eyelids where your tears drain. With a quick, simple procedure, your eye care professional can insert a tiny, soft plug into any of your four puncta to help your eye retain their tears. By blocking the places that the tears drain, more tears stay in your eyes, bringing them back to a comfortable, more natural moisture level. We can easily remove the Punctal Plugs, but it is rarely necessary.  To make sure that punctual plug therapy will be right for you, we can insert temporary Collagen Plugs first. These plugs will give you a good idea of what punctual plugs can do and will dissolve within 4—8 days.