Eye pain and visual problems

[Kath_922]

I'm a 22 year old female, who apart from being short sighted and having floaters had no eye problems. For the past month have been having eye pain that tends to hurt more when focusing in on something. I've noticed my eye pain is worst at work while on the computer or if I'm looking at something for a longer period of time. The pain itself feels like a sharp muscle pain and makes me feel as though I need to close my eye. The pain tends to effect one eye at a time. Along with the pain I've also developed an increase in light sensitivity and disability glare which results in frequent afterimages that last around 1-4 minutes. I've also had an increase in afterimages from other light sources such as computer, tv, reading text on contrast (black and white, produced block lines in my vision that went away 30 secs after). Another thing I've noticed is that if I blink the light I'm looking at tends to stretch. I have been to a couple of optromitrists who have said the glare issues could be related to dry eye. I have also seen an opthamologist who has said that it's either migrane with aura or the developing of light sensitivity. As for now the pain has still not been adressed and I'm having a hard time believing it's migrane related when I don't suffer from the head symptoms and seems to be more of a problem with light itself. My vision just doesn't seem as good as it previously was, like there's a delay and my vision feels constantly shaken like my eyes are throbbing. At the moment I've also noticed a flicker in my vision just to add to things.

I have had my eyes dilated a couple of times within the month would this have caused any of these issues?

As you can imagine I'm freaked and just want to know kind of what's happening.

[JohnHaganMD]

I'm going to assume you don't wear contacts because contacts often cause that kind of problem. Nor is it likely migraine. Have you scratched your eye in the last 6 months. Poor healing of a cornea abrasion can cause such symptoms its called recurrent corneal erosion syndrome.    If no contacts and not injury I agree that you are having dry eye symptoms. They are aggravated a great deal by any electronic screen, reading, TV and movies. the reason is when you do these tasks our blink drops from about 30 per minute to 4-5 per minute. When you do any of these look away from the computer, TV, book look across the room and blink firmly 15 times do this every 15 minutes. Its called the 15-15-15 and refers to minutes/feet away/forceful blinks.  Also use artificial tears 3-4 times/day. Keep track of several brands so you find what works best for you. Don't sleep under a fan at night and don't run your AC or heater in your face. Use a lubricating gel in your eyes at bedtime (e.g. Genteal Gel, Refresh Liquigel, Systane gel).  It's a chronic problem and you will need to do this daily to keep them comfortable.

[Kath_922]

Thanks for the response! I do wear contacts but have stopped wearing them for weeks now. I've seen atleast 3 different people and they've not mentioned anything wrong with my cornea. So can all these symptoms actually be down to dry eye especially the glare/starbusts around lights?

[Kath_922]

And the afterimages?

[JohnHaganMD]

When you wear contacts and begin to have problems (as you clearly are) and stop wearing them it can takes as long as 6 months for the cornea to recovery. Contacts often cause "irregular astigmatism" which can only be measured with cornea topographer.  A routine eye exam by an eye MD or optometrist often will not show signs of dry eye. Often the diagnosis is made from the history.  And yes all the symptoms you describe can be due to dry eyes plus the added trauma to the eye from contact lens.   You should also have an Eye MD or optome flip your upper lids to be sure you do not have Giant Papillary Conjunctivitis (GPC) from the contacts, that is more common with dry eyes also.   After images are a normal physiological property of the eye that falls within entopic phenomena. Some people are not aware of these while others are hyperaware.

[Kath_922]

Thanks! One last thing is the afterimages are negative the ones associated with glare like flash blindness, is that completely normal then?

[JohnHaganMD]

yes the dark ones are "negative" and the light ones are "positive" or as you used light/dark

[JohnHaganMD]

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