By 2030, the CDC expects the number of blind and visually impaired people to double.
It’s important to make sure that you keep your regularly scheduled eye doctor appointments. If you have gone to the eye doctor recently, they may have recommended you use eye drops.
However, it’s important to choose the best eye drops for you. Keep reading for 5 key tips for choosing the best eye drops for your condition.
1. Prescription vs. Non-Prescription
There are also prescription and non-prescription eye drops. All of the following eye drops in this article will fall into one of these categories.
A non-prescription eye drop may help treat your symptoms, but it will depend on what you are trying to treat.
You should talk to your doctor before you start using one of these. You will also need to talk to your doctor to get a prescription eye drop.
After you talk with your doctor, check out this eye drop guide to make sure you find the best one for your eyes.
2. Allergy Drops
If your eyes are red and itchy from allergies, you may want to look into getting some allergy drops.
Allergens like pet dander, mold, and pollen can get into your eyes and cause them to bed itchy, watery, and red.
Using antihistamines, you can block this reaction.
There are some allergy eye drops that will even stop your body from making histamines rather than blocking them. If you want these, they are called mast-cell stabilizers.
3. Artificial Tears
If your eyes tend to be dry a lot, you may want to get artificial teardrops.
Some of the artificial tears may even help heal your eyes from minor tears and scrapes. They will also help keep your eyes moist by lessening tear evaporation.
some of these eye drops also have a thickening agent to keep the solution on your eyes for longer than normal to make sure eyes don’t immediately dry up.
4. Infections
A lot of the eye drops for infections will be prescribed eye drops.
However, they can help treat things such as allergic conjunctivitis, viral conjunctivitis (like pink eye), and bacterial conjunctivitis.
If you notice any of these symptoms, you may want to get eye drops that can treat infections:
- Abnormal discharge
- Sore eyes
- Red eyes
- Pink eyes
- Watery
- Blurred vision
- Itching
- Swelling
- Bloodshot eyes
The eye drops should not only treat these illnesses, but they can also relieve your symptoms.
5. For Contact Lenses
Lastly, there are eye drops you can use if you wear contacts.
These will help rewet your eyes so that they don’t get as dry throughout the day when you wear them.
Before you start using these, check with your eye doctor to make sure that they are okay to use with your particular type of contacts.
Choose The Best Eye Drops Today
Choosing the best eye drops is important because you don’t want to end up damaging your vision.
As with anything related to your health, you should check with your doctor before you start using any of these.
If you enjoyed this article, make sure you check out some of our other blog posts for other health-related tips!
