Often contact lenses can lead to dry eye syndrome. Eyes will feel itchy and irritated and wearing contacts will become become very uncomfortable. However, the actual topic of this article goes towards the opposite site. Contact lenses can actually help to prevent eyes from becoming too dry. Why is that you might ask. If one is already suffering from severe eye dryness some contact lens brands can a) help to stop the eyes from drying and b) release some gel from their inner surface to the eye and therefore keeping the eye refreshed and wet. Wet might be the wrong term as we are talking about dry eyes, but compared to how the eye would feel like without this little help, wet is a good term.
I am wearing contact lenses since 1997 and just recently I found out the hard way that I am actually suffering from dry eye syndrome. I had signs of this in the past, but never ever put the dots together until now. What had happened was that I bruised my left eye really bad. After 10 days the eye was still extremely red and started feeling itchy. I made an appointment with my eye doctor accordingly to get the eye checked out. I was wearing my glasses that day and my eyes were really hurting when I arrived for my appointment in the late afternoon. The eye doctor checked out my eyes and noticed the severe dryness. He went back through my chart and asked me a few questions. He then came back with the following explanation.
For one, my left eye was Ok. It was bruised, but otherwise Ok (besides the dryness). But he also determined the severe eye dryness and then explained to me how the contacts I am using actually protect my eyes from drying too much. And when he explained the details to me it suddenly all made much more sense. So, I went home and even though it was late afternoon I swapped glasses to contacts and within one hour my eyes were actually feeling much better.
So, if you are suffering from dry eyes I highly recommend talking to your eye doctor. A combination of specific contact lenses and eye plugs can significantly lower your dry eye symptoms. It might take a couple of weeks before you see the results – depending on your situation. In my case when I switched contact lenses I saw improvements within about 7 days.