so managing dry eye syndrome can be very challenging especially if you're somebody
who doesn't like using eye drops or taking medications so today i'm going to share my natural
dry eye routine the same thing that i use every single day to help manage my own dry eye symptoms
and hopefully by sharing this with you you can incorporate some of these strategies into your
lifestyle and help improve your dry eye symptoms as well that's today's video let's take a look
hey what's up this is Dr Allen here from the Doctor eye health show helping you learn all
about the eyes vision and finding the best vision products if you are new here to the channel and
like learning about your eyes seeing your best then consider hitting the subscribe button down
below and ring the bell so that you don't miss any of our future videos now today we're talking
about dry eye syndrome and i'll be sharing my dry eye routine the natural dry eye treatment
that i do every single day to manage my own dry eye symptoms now if you're somebody who
doesn't like using eye drops you don't like medications i think this will be
the most beneficial for you but if you're just starting out on this journey and you haven't
seen our other videos on dry eye syndrome going over the different medical aspects to dry eye
the diagnosis and all the advanced treatments i encourage you to check out our full video series
on that and i'll put a link to that at the top of the video description below this video so you
can find it easily but i think it's a great place for you to get resources on exactly what dry eye
is and finding maybe a dry eye specialist in your area to help you with your treatment now when it
comes to my dry eye routine this is what i've been doing every single day and it has significantly
helped me with my symptoms the first thing that i do every day when i wake up is that i go drink
at least one to two glasses of water at night time our bodies are processing a lot for our muscles
and our organs and so it does use a lot of water and most of us do often wake up feeling dehydrated
so if you're naturally a person who just first turns on the coffee pot or start drinking
coffee or tea right away those are diuretics and often do basically cause our bodies to dehydrate
even more so i encourage you right now if you're not drinking enough water start off at least right
away in the day drinking one to two glasses of water the second thing i do is i do a warm
compress now i've talked about warm compresses a lot on this channel because it does help with the
oil glands of the eyelids produce better oils now myself i actually do warm compresses twice a day
i do one in the morning and then one at night in the morning i have been enjoying using a
device called the tier restore and i've worked with t restore in the past and i even have
a review going over the tear restore mask this is a dry eye mask that allows you to keep your eyes
open so most warm compresses you have to keep your eyelids closed but because this one lets you keep
your eyes open with my busy lifestyle i don't have to slow down usually i have about 35-40 minutes
to get ready for work before i'm out the door heading to the clinic so i need to stay productive
and so this allows me to at least put on the mask for about 10-12 minutes and i'm able to you
know get my clothes together get my lunch ready anything i need to do after doing any sort of warm
compress i do like to do an eyelid massage after using the tear restore i usually am brushing my
teeth and then i can easily use what's called the new lids dry eye device this is a special type of
eyelid massager and cleaner so if you're somebody has bad blepharitis and irritation to your eyelids
this will clean your eyelids really good get rid of all those dead skin cells and skin oils
away from the eyes but it also will agitate the meibomian glands in the eyelids which essentially
is doing a meibomian gland massage to encourage those glands to open up and release their content
and since you did a tea restore or warm compress before that makes those oils run a lot smoother so
i find that the new lids device works even better if you're not sure how to do an eyelid massage on
your own or if you want to learn more about the new lids device i have other videos going over
that and again you'll find those links in the video description below now after performing
these first three steps i usually do not have much for symptoms for dryness throughout the day
in some extreme situations i'll do more blinking exercises or even use a non-preserved artificial
tear i think a lot of people again are trying to avoid using eye drops but i think if you're
having a really tough day don't be afraid to use them especially if your eye doctor recommends
you do so now something i also incorporate into my lifestyle is eating whole healthy foods this means
a lot of fruits and vegetables and then i also make sure i get omega-3s into my diet in some form
that can be through ground flaxseed in the morning with oatmeal but it can also incorporate
using different amounts of omega-3s and forms of supplements now i personally take a supplement for
my dry eyes called EZ tears there's many different supplements out there ones that i've tried as
well as ones other healthcare professionals will recommend usually these supplements all
incorporate some level of omega-3 fatty acid as well as vitamin d and a couple of other small
nutrients just to help support the blood flow to the eye as well as getting the oil glands to pump
better and other aspects of these vitamins are to help reduce the inflammatory load in the body and
especially on the surface of the eye because inflammation does play a large critical role
in the development of dry eye disease you can of course look into supplements like easy tears but
i strongly encourage you always talk with a medical professional in your area your eye doctor
and ask what they recommend in terms of brands or if supplementation is even something you
should be considering otherwise the next steps in my dry routine all occur in the evening
and it revolves around taking care of my eyelids now first i clean my eyelids in the evening
with a hypochlorous acid solution there are many different brands of hypochlorous acid it's tough
for me to say really which ones are better or not but i'll include a couple of the ones that i use
down in the description below but the hypochlorous acid solution is very safe and it cleans your
eyelids gets rid of any of those extra skin oils and buildup of skin cells again that
contribute to what's called blepharitis which does contribute to development of dry eye disease
so i clean my eyelids really good i remove my contact lenses and then right when i'm heading
to bed i like to use another warm compress now i actually use what's called an EyeEco
product which is either the tranquilized xl the tranquilized cloud or even the tranquilized
vibes i've used all three of these and i think they work great now i use the tranquilize or
the EyeEco products in the evening because i find them more effective than something just like the
tier restore the tea restore is great because your eyes are open and lets you stay productive
in the early mornings but at night time that i find the tranquilize EyeEco products just do a
lot better job and they do this because the EyeEco products not just activate heat for 10 minutes but
they hold their heat for at least 20 to 25 minutes depending on the product but they also don't just
give dry heat but they give moist heat so they actually help trap the right amount of humidity
around the eyelids and holds it there for that full treatment period and this extra level of
humidity and moisture is really important for helping stabilize the salt content of your
tears which we call your tier osmolarity now i've talked about a lot of different warm compresses
on the market anywhere from the teary store to the EyeEco to the brooder masks there's again
many different ways out there this is just what i personally use and find to be most effective
i would say most nights i'm either using the tranquilize xl or the tranquilize cloud because
they're just very comfortable to wear i can close my eyes and to be honest a lot of times i'll even
fall asleep with these on and i'll wake up either in the middle of the night or the next morning and
i'll find the the tranquilized uh warm compress like somewhere near me i do use the tranquilized
vibes quite a bit especially if i'm just having a harder time falling asleep feeling more rested the
tranquilized vibes also vibrates it plugs in and vibrates to help get your oil glands pumping again
that one i really do like however it's something you have to pay attention to because it doesn't
just shut off on its own otherwise it's kind of a way to get both the warm compress and the eyelid
massage all happening all at once but i'm a firm believer that doing this type of a warm compress
at night time significantly improves my dry eye symptoms especially throughout the night and
then certainly when i wake up in the morning and then again the next morning i basically hit the
repeat button and start all over again now the key important thing for having success for dry eyes is
not just doing a few of these once or twice but it's doing them consistently every single day
i know for a lot of my patients and for a lot of other eye doctors out there uh we know that
a lot of people will start taking some advice or recommendations that we give them but then they
just don't utilize it maybe they'll try it once or twice they'll do a warm compress for like a week
and then they kind of forget about it and becomes kind of set off to the side somewhere
is this something you need to really learn and incorporate into your daily lifestyle
that way you're going to have the most success with it with any of these strategies i even had
one of my patients who got something like the new lids device and only used it a few times
and then returned it because they found it wasn't helping well the new lids device takes at least
30 days of doing it every single day to have a clinical benefit and they've shown that in studies
and you can really say that about any form of treatment for dry eyes because i think with dry
eyes it's almost impossible to fully cure it it's really just something that you manage kind of like
arthritis it never goes away but it's something that you have to manage to keep it at bay
and occasionally it may flare up and then something more advanced like maybe medications
or an office procedure may be more maybe really more important but i do want to pass this off
to you what other techniques or strategies are you using in your daily dry eye routine that are
really helping you go ahead and share those in the comments section because i know other people
who are watching this may be curious what has been helping other people is there something that they
haven't tried again let those leave those comments in the section below because i really want this to
be a resource for everybody otherwise i hope you enjoyed this video if you did get value on it hit
the like button for me because that's going to let the whole youtube algorithm know that you value
this content and by your help you're going to help make this channel reach more people and it's
going to help people around the world learn more about their dry eyes and their eye health again
thanks for watching and if you want to learn more about the diagnosis of dry eye and the different
treatments that are out there check out the full series by clicking and tapping the screen right
over here to the side or if you want to learn more about different things about eye care things like
contact lenses for dry eyes or something go ahead and click or tap the screen down over
here again this is Dr Allen from dr eye health keep an eye on it and we'll talk to you soon