These are the possible causes of dry eyes and here’s how to fix it

 

Having dry eyes is a very common problem

Teary and red eyes, blurry vision and an itch that makes you want to rub your eyes all the time. These are just a couple of symptoms of dry eyes. Unfortunately, quite a lot of people suffer from this. Eye expert Viviane de Vries explains what the causes are and, more importantly, what you can do about it.

Dry eyes are very annoying.

Tears

“Your eyes become dry when they don’t produce enough tears or if these tears are of insufficient quality,” the optometrist explains. “If you want to prevent or fix it, the first thing you need to do is discover the cause. Depending on the cause, dry eyes can be accompanied by other problems like itchiness, a burning sensation, tears and redness.”

Causes

According to De Vries, there are multiple causes, from air pollution to working in a space with air conditioning. Dry eyes can also be caused by staring at a computer screen for extended periods of time. When you’re focused on your work, you often forget to blink often enough. The same goes for watching television. As we’re getting older, the quality of our tear film becomes less as well. Besides this, women suffer from dry eyes more often than men because hormones play a big role too. Especially during and after the menopause nearly every woman has problems with this at some point. Medication or certain illnesses can have an influence as well.

Tips

Although some things, like air pollution, can’t really be changed or avoided, there are a couple of things you can do to try and fix your dry eyes. De Vries gives us some tips:

• Try to cut in moments during the day when you let your eyes rest, especially if you spend your time working on a computer. Try to remember the twenty-twenty rule. After every twenty minutes you spend working on a computer, make sure you take twenty seconds to look away from your screen to a distance of twenty metres. During those twenty seconds, you can blink some more again so your tear film gets the chance to recover.
• Make sure the humidity is as high as possible in dry, dusty rooms. Avoid air conditioning and heaters as these dehydrate spaces as well as your eyes.
• Blink as often and as well as possible. Generally speaking, you blink once every four seconds, which means about fifteen times per minute. Make sure your upper eyelid touches the bottom one when you blink.
• Wear sunglasses. Being blinded by light can have a negative effect on your eyes and dries them out as well.
• When you can’t take away the cause of your dry eyes, the best thing to do is to use eye drops. These days, you can also find good homoeopathic substances at the drugstore. Do you still have dry eyes after this? Then it’s wise to consult an eye doctor.