have you ever been to an optometrist because you felt like your eyes were changing but it turns
out you have some sort of dry eye syndrome that causes your vision to fluctuate well
i see this on a daily basis and i feel that if a lot of people
knew just a few little tricks then i feel like most of their vision problems would go away
so today we'll be talking about number one why this happens in the first place
number two how you can properly manage it and number three what products i would recommend
for this to begin the type of dry eye that i'll be talking about today is
posterior blepharitis also known as meibomian gland dysfunction which is when our oil glands
don't function properly and it's estimated to affect about 35 percent of the global population
there are many things that contribute to causing an mgd which include hormonal changes meibomian
glands have hormonal receptors on them so major changes to hormones can affect its production
systemic medications like roaccutane for skin which can change the oil production
physiology diet something that i talked about in my omega-3 video right here prolonged computer use
and contact lens wear as a result of these risk factors the following two things happen number
one hyperkeratinization normally functioning cells will proliferate live its life and then when their
time is up they will shed off when there's a chronic irritation on the eyelids a process
called hyperkeratinization occurs where the life cycle of the skin is disturbed because of a higher
rate of proliferation excess keratin formation and accumulation of skin due to a lack of shedding in
case you're wondering i am not swearing this is just my accent i know it sounds funny i am saying
shed ding not (naughty word) hyperkeratinization will cause the mebomian glands to block up
and therefore your tear layer will not receive the necessary oils it needs to function properly
resulting in quicker evaporation of tears which can also lead to further inflammation and number
two bacterial colonization love this stuff they can break the waxes and esters into triglycerides
and free fatty acids which diffuse into the mucin layer making it more hydrophobic this means that
the cornea will repel water which is the exact opposite of what you want because you want your
eyes to be moisturized the abnormal meibum due to the bacteria will now have a higher melting point
something that's higher than our natural body's temperature and therefore it will solidify
here are two examples of meibomian glands blocked due to solidification here on this
picture we can see that the meibomian glands are not providing the eye with meibum because the oils
have completely solidified due to the bacterial lipases and on this picture the same thing is
happening but on the lower eyelid if we zoom out we can also see that on the palpebral conjunctiva
there are some bumps which are called papillae and this is exactly how your eye doctor knows whether
your eyes are happy or not now that we've talked about the underlying mechanism let's actually
talk about the treatment optometrists will often tell you to do hot compresses or artificial tears
but no one really sits down with you and teaches you how to do it properly hot compresses are very
similar to flossing your teeth the more you do it and the more consistently you do it the happier
your dentist will be likewise with hot compresses the more you do it and the more consistently you
do it the happier your optometrist will be however unlike flossing there doesn't seem to be any major
brands like colgate or oral b selling these really nice products in the supermarket and for the
longest time i've heard various stories about how people do hot compresses from using a warm flannel
all the way to using used tea bags but i recently stumbled across this product called Opti-Soothe
which is what i'll be using for this demonstration full disclaimer this is not a sponsored post
opti-soothe or whoever makes this stuff don't even know i exist this is just something i found to be
effective and i bought mine from the pharmacy the other day which leads me to another point
that optisoothe comes in two colors so don't get confused green which is an eyelid wipe used for
anterior blepharitis and blue which is used for posterior blepharitis or what we're talking about
today meibomian gland dysfunction if you can't find this product where you are then don't worry
you can just use wheat bags that you have lying around the house or you can just easily get one
from amazon or somewhere to do this properly you want to essentially heat the mask up so that we
can melt away the blocked oil glands the heat will make the oil more runny and therefore your
eyes will have a much easier time distributing it on the box it says to microwave for 25 seconds but
if you read the instructions on the mask itself it tells you exactly how many seconds you have
to microwave it for depending on your wattage i have a 1000 watt microwave so in the instructions
it says to microwave for about 15 seconds but from my testing i find that about 20 seconds
is what i find almost optimum but there is no hard and fast rule when it comes to heating this up
if you feel that it's hot enough then it's probably hot enough my suggestion is to heat it
up until you can comfortably hold it in your hand without it feeling too hot to touch after heating
you want to apply it on your eyes while you have your eyes closed for about five to seven minutes
if it feels way too hot then allow enough time to cool before reapplying for the next five minutes
stay calm and think about how happy your eyes will feel after this i like to just shut off my brain
for a few minutes and think about nothing after the five minutes are up for an added benefit you
can massage your eyelids this is somewhat similar to squeezing toothpaste you want to squeeze out
all the oils out of these glands one thing that i noticed is that people massage their eyes in
all the wrong ways you want to massage upwards on the lower eyelid and downwards on the upper eyelid
you don't want to massage in a circular motion after massaging blink a few times and your eyes
should immediately feel amazing do this anywhere from once a day to once a week
and your optometrist will love you for it but more importantly your eyes will love you for it
you can now work on the computer and go on your phone for hours without feeling so irritated
well there you have it how to do hot compresses properly if you learned something new or at least
found something useful then yay thumbs up to you if you want to thumbs up back then they'll
be greatly appreciated subscribe if you haven't already and i'll see you in the next video you