What is Dry Eye?

Have you noticed your eye get tired easily or blurred? That could mean that you are suffering from dry eye syndrome. Well, it does not necessarily mean that you have dry eye but it signals that your eye is tired, experiencing visual fatigue or having insufficient tear production. Tear production plays a very important role in lubricating your eye thus preventing dry eye. A lack of tears would lead to dry eye.

Besides inadequate tear production, a poor quality tear production could also result in dry eye. When there is a lack of tears or a presence of poor quality tears, the surface of the eye will be inflamed and this will lead to the surface of the eye being damaged. It will cause discomfort and causes you eye to feel a burning sensation. Dry eye is becoming a very common situation and its prevalence is increasing. Many people do experience the symptoms but they are not diagnosed. This causes many people who have dry eye but are unaware that they have it. They will leave it untreated and in the long run it will severely damage the surface of their eye.

Symptoms of Dry Eye

There are many symptoms or indications that signals that you have dry eyes. The symptoms may include:

• Eye redness
• Burning sensation in the eye
• Fatigued eyes
• Itchy and irritated eyes
• Sore eyes
• Eye dryness 
• Blurred vision
• Watery eyes
• Difficulty driving at night
• Stringy mucus formation in or around the eye

These symptoms would usually affect both eyes.

You may wonder isn’t watery eyes good to combat dry eye? That is not the case. The watery eyes is considered as the response of the eye to lubricate the surface of eye. As good as it may seem, the “water” or tear that is produced is actually over produced . This is due to the fact that the dryness of the eye surface over-stimulates the formation of the “water” or tears and thus leading to watery eyes. The other problem is that the tears that is over produced will not stay long enough on the surface of the eye to solve the eye dryness.

What Causes Dry Eye?

There are plenty of reasons that may cause this problem. The two biggest contributor to this problem is decreased tear production and increased tear evaporation. Tears is essential to the eyes as it keeps the surface of the eye well lubricated, moist, wash away dusts, debris and microorganisms that could otherwise damage the cornea of the eye and in the worst case scenario it could lead to an eye infection. Decreased tear production is when eye is unable to produce sufficient water or aqueous fluid while increased tear evaporation is when the tears that is produced evaporates faster than usual and does not stay on the surface of the eye for long enough leaving the eye to feel dry.

Besides decreased tear production and increased tear evaporation, there are other factors that could increase your risk of getting dry eyes.

Factors that increases dry eye risk:

1. Long Screen Time – Many of us work using our computer and often stare at our computer screen for hours. The current pandemic does not help either as it meant that we would all work from home and therefore continue using the computer. Using the computer causes us to blink lesser thus increasing the tear evaporation.

2. Aging – Those above the age of 50 face the a higher risk of getting dry eye because tear production gets lesser as you get older.

3. Contact lens wear – Wearing contact lens could lead to itching, burning sensation and redness. Wearing contact lens for long period of time is one of the reasons.

4. Vitamin A deficiency -Having a diet that is low in Vitamin A could increase dry eye risk.

How to Prevent Dry Eyes

There are a few ways that could significantly reduce your risk. The first is to of course to reduce screen time. Whether it is reducing screen time during working or to reduce watching shows or videos on the internet. While working, you could take a break from looking at the screen. Perhaps taking a break for every 20 minutes from the screen and looking elsewhere. Next, as many of us are working from home due to the pandemic, we should setup our work space in a way that it does not strain our eyes. We should place our computer screen at least 70cm from our face and below our eye level.

Besides screen time and screen setup, we need to ensure that the air in our house should have good humidity. We should also refrain from scratching and rubbing our eyes as it could irritate our eyes. Eye drops should be used regularly to keep our eyes well lubricated and reduce the risk of getting dry eyes.

Combination of Omega-3 and Astaxanthin – Powerful for Dry Eyes.

In order to combat dry eye, Powerlife Optiglo 60s is the most reviewed product. It can reduce your risk of getting dry eyes. This product is specially designed to reduce dry eye syndrome. The benefits of this product includes:

• Improving eye health
• Protect eyes from dry eye syndrome
• Protect your central vision from blue light absorption
• Slow progression of advanced age-related macular degeneration
• Strong antioxidant

Powerlife Optiglo features a unique combination of fish oil, astaxanthin, lutein, zeaxanthin, vitamin E, zinc and copper. This complex blend is specially designed to protect eyes from macular degeneration. Omega-3 essential fatty acids alone are clinically proven in reduced tear osmolarity and increased tear stability in people with dry eye disease. On top of that, astaxanthin is the most powerful carotenoid antioxidant, which is 65 times stronger than vitamin C and 54 times stronger than beta-carotene. Astaxanthin provides superior protection against oxidation of retinal tissues and supports eye’s energy levels and visual acuity.