Corneal abrasion is a superficial scratch in the outer lens of the eye. It is usually caused by improper wearing of contact lenses or by particles that get lodged in the eye. A scratched cornea can be painful and alarming. Good thing is that the eyes are one of the quickest healers in the body and scratched corneas are easy to treat. Some of the symptoms of corneal abrasions include pain, redness, sensitivity to light, blurred vision, excessive tears, the feeling that there is an object or particle in the eye, and possible swelling of the eye.

Natural healing process

A scratch in the cornea can heal completely within 24 to 48 hours, depending on the severity, leaving no permanent damage when healed. During this time, the cells will reconnect the undamaged layers and renew the scratched part of the cornea. If you feel like you scratched your cornea, do not rub your eyes! It will only worsen the abrasion. Instead, flush your eyes with water to get rid of the object or particle that scratched your eye. Use a cold compress over your eye to keep it from swelling and lessen the pain. Keep your eyes closed and let it rest. If you cannot wait too long and the pain or discomfort is unbearable, you should contact an eye doctor in urbane scrubs to see if you need treatment.

Seeing an eye doctor

To ease the pain, anesthetic eye drops are typically used during examination and to prevent infection, an eye doctor will usually recommend antibiotic eye drops. After the treatment, the doctor will cover your eye with a tight eye patch to prevent your eyelid from moving. You will have to wear the eye patch for at least 24 hours so that the healing process will not be disturbed and so that it repairs quickly and smoothly.

What to avoid

Those who wear contact lenses should not wear it for the whole period of the treatment and healing period because it will only slow down the healing process. Also, the medication can cloud or stain soft lenses, thereby damaging it. Superficial cornea abrasions do not cause permanent blindness or loss of vision but it may blur your vision temporarily. Once your eye heals, it may take a few weeks before your clear vision returns (if you had clear vision before the abrasion). During this time, it is advised that you refrain from rubbing your eyes. This will slow down the healing process or even aggravate the abrasion.

Recurrence

In some instances, a corneal abrasion can spontaneously recur long after it has healed, usually occurring when you wake up in the morning. This happens when an area of the eye’s epithelium failed to reconnect to the deeper layers of the cornea. When this happens, it is best to go to the eye doctor so that a special instrument can be used to form better connections between the layers of the cornea. The treatment will be similar to the one that was administered in the original abrasion. You can also ask your doctor about lubricants or ointments that you can use to prevent recurrent abrasions.

Dry eye syndrome is not an eye problem that is not popular among people in modern times. If it is not taken care of, it can get worse and even affect our normal life. In order to treat and prevent this eye ailment effectively, we need to go through the symptoms, causes and cures of dry eyes one by one so that you can live a life with healthy eyes starting from the moment you leave this page.

Symptoms

People with dry eye syndrome complain that they feel like something in the eyes and their eyes are prone to get tired. Some of them even have photophobia, intermittent blurred vision and other vision problems.

Causes

With the computer becoming the most important part of our lives, we are spending more and more time in front of the monitor. We work in front of it. We entertain ourselves in front it, too. It is even taking the place of books and televisions. The other day, the news told me that over 70% of the households in Beijing are internet users.

When we are focusing on things, our eyes will blink less. The reduced frequency of eye blinking will lead to prolonged exposure of the eyeballs to the air. The longer the exposure is, the more tear film will be evaporated. As a result, dry points will occur at the surface of the cornea, which can possibly cause keratitis.

When we are working for a long time in front of the computer, a substance called visual purple will be consumed. This is why dry eye syndrome is often caused by overusing them.

Natural Treatment

The visual purple is primarily synthesized from Vitamin A. So eating foods that are rich in Vitamin A, like carrots, Chinese cabbage, milk, tofu and lean meat, will alleviate the symptoms.

Another treatment for dry eyes is drinking tea. The tea polyphenols contained in tea is a strong antioxidant, which can protect our eyes from radiation. Tea also contains carotene which can be converted into Vitamin A in our body.

What used to be a mere wishful thinking for people with eyesight difficulties can now be a reality. Because of the modern vision correction solutions offered today, people with eyesight problems may acquire a near-perfect vision and still look splendid and in-the-crowd! Gone are the oppressive days when geeks are obviously geeks and people wearing thick eyeglasses are classified solely as doctors or CPA’s. Today, there are two popular treatment methods for blurred vision and poor eyesight. Through these processes, one can do without eyeglasses and still have a pair of sharp eyes.

Laser Eye Surgery

Refractive laser eye surgery is among the leading vision correction procedures. This process balances the elements of your eyes by doing some changes on your cornea so that your eyesight will be able to focus on objects; this procedure minimizes your error of refraction. Once laser eye surgery is done, you will have no need for your reading glasses. This is the reason why, refractive eye surgery is also considered as a lifestyle change on top of being a medical process.

Refractive laser eye surgery may be done in two ways. One is through Photorefractive Keratectomy or PRK. Or two, via Laser In Situ Keratomilieusis better known as LASIK. These two processes basically remodel the cornea by melting or taking away certain corneal tissues.

In Photorefractive Keratectomy or PRK, changes in the cornea are done directly on the external coating of the eyes, directly on the covering of the iris. By using laser technology, parts of the cornea is taken away to improve the focus of the eyes. Due to the direct approach of this procedure, patients should expect some pain and even irritation of the eyes for a few days after the treatment.

On the other hand, Laser In Situ Keratomilieusis or LASIK is a more complicated procedure where a flap in the cornea is created to reveal its middle section. It is in this middle section called stroma that the laser will vaporize certain corneal tissues. After the laser treatment, the flap of corneal tissue is carefully repositioned or folded back to cover the eyes. In this procedure, you can see that the operation pinpoints the specific corneal tissues to vaporize. For this reason, LASIK surgery is more popular because it is comfortable and requires less time for the patient to recover.

Laser eye surgery is applicable for cases like blurred vision caused by the shape of cornea, nearsightedness, and farsightedness. But what happens to people who are not fit for this type of eyesight correction?

Lens Modification Process

Believe it or not, in an age where lasers are fast becoming ordinary medical tools, there are cases where lasers can be useless. Take the case of people with extraordinarily thick corneas or people with severe irregularities in their cornea, these types of patients are not eligible for laser surgery. But for the sake of ditching the horn-rimmed glasses and attaining good vision, people who are not fit for laser eye treatment may choose to have a lens modification procedure instead.

Lens modification can be done via two processes. The first one is the traditional procedure where the natural lenses of the eyes are replaced with artificial ones. This procedure may entail risks that include the patient’s loss of sight focus with things that are near him or her. The second type of lens modification, on the other hand, simply inserts artificial lenses on top of the natural ones.

Indeed, one of the reasons that eye experts came up with these procedures is to correct one’s vision and allow patients to have better eyesight without the cumbersome eyeglasses or easily-lost contact lenses. In effect, these eye sight procedures provide patients with more comfort and allow them to uncover their beautiful eyes without compromising eyesight.

The risks associated with lasik eye surgery is not discussed much simply because it’s an extremely safe procedure. The benefits far outweigh any risks yet, there are risks involved.

You should never go into any surgical procedure with “rose colored glasses”… at least not before you understand there may be complications involved.

In this article, we’ll examine some of the more common Lasik eye surgery risks.

Sight Loss

The most obvious complication is to lose sight. Does this happen? Not that you’d hear about it but it’s strongly recommended you discuss it with your surgeon.

It would be extremely rare for any eye surgery to take place if it was discovered during the screening process you had a condition which was considered risky to the overall success of the treatment.

If someone was to suffer loss of vision it would more than likely be part vision which could not be rectified by using eyewear or further surgery.

Frustrating Halos

Halos might be considered holy in religious circles but they are on the not wanted list and a Lasik eye surgery risk you should be told about during the consultation phase. The problems with halo effects is that they generally occur during low light conditions and can hamper such things as driving at night.

Dry Eyes

Another Lasik eye surgery risk is what is known as dry eye syndrome. While dry eye shouldn’t have any long term effects it does present a degree of discomfort to the patient because the eye doesn’t produce enough moisture. This can lead to such things as blurred vision.

Dry eye doesn’t need to be permanent and will require further treatment either via your surgeon or through recommended eye drop use.

Extra Treatment

It’s not uncommon for patients to re-visit their surgeons following the initial Lasik treatment. Whether it’s for extra surgery or simply as a precautionary measure to keep an eye on the recovery process.

In fact, perfect vision following the initial surgery can be rare with patients who used eyewear before the procedure. They could need additional treatment and they still be required to wear glasses or contacts.

These are just a small sample of Lasik eye surgery risk factors you could encounter but you shouldn’t get hung up on them pre-surgery. The percentage of complications which actually occur is extremely low. These risks should be discussed with you when you sit down and talk with your specialist.

Refractive surgery (LASIK) often produces amazing results, however, as with any medical procedure, there are risks involved. If you’re considering LASIK, it’s important that you are aware of the limitations and possible complications that may arise.

According to FDA reports, nearly 100% of LASIK patients have good results and no complications, but you need to be aware that there are things that can and do go wrong. Some problems include double or triple vision, light distortion so severe that patients can’t drive at night, or eyes so dry that they have to wear goggles when going outside.

Some patients experience infections, inflammation of the eye, redness, blurriness or eye irritation. In many cases, LASIK eye surgery can eliminate your need for corrective lenses, but that’s not always the result. Sometimes, LASIK will drastically reduce your dependence on corrective lenses, but you may still require corrective lenses for some activities, such as reading. It’s best to think of LASIK as reducing your dependency upon corrective lenses – not necessarily as eliminating your need for them.

Diffuse lamellar keratitis is a post operative LASIK risk that happens when a foreign substance, such as a hair or speck of dirt gets trapped behind the corneal flap. If this happens to you, you may experience pain, light sensitivity, blurred vision, along with the sensation that something is trapped in your eye. Rubbing will only intensify the problem and may lead to further complications, such as infection or tearing or dislodging of the corneal flap. Diffuse lamellar keratitis usually occurs as the result of the patient not exercising proper precautions during the healing period after LASIK eye surgery.

One of the most common complications of LASIK eye surgery is a slipped flap. The flap that was created during the LASIK procedure may become detached from the rest of the cornea. Most doctors recommend that you go home and sleep for several hours after completing the LASIK procedure in order to allow the cornea to start its healing process. That’s good advice and can substantially reduce your chances of experiencing a slipped flap.

Even without LASIK eye surgery, it’s expected that everyone’s eyes will change slightly with the passage of time – it’s just a natural part of life. After LASIK, your eyes will still follow their natural course of changing with time, so LASIK shouldn’t necessarily be considered a permanent solution. For most people however, their vision will not change enough to require any additional treatments, especially when the original procedure was done to correct for poor distant vision.

The information provided here is not intended to scare you away from LASIK eye surgery, since it has been a blessing to a great many people. For many who have chosen LASIK, it has meant that they are no longer dependent on corrective lenses in order to have good vision. It’s highly recommended that you talk with your doctor about LASIK and how any possible risks or side effects relate to your own personal circumstances.