If you live in the Richmond area, you have seen the carpet of yellow pollen covering all of the cars and sometimes the street as well. The rain helped settle it out of the air and left beautiful yellow swirls in the parking lot one day after work too!
Some tips to help you combat itchy eyes during this time of year and dry eyes that can be made worse with allergies too:
- Wash your hands and face too after coming in from outside. So simple but important to get the allergens off your hands, face and clothes when you come in from outside.
- Do not rub your eyes. So simple but important! Rubbing your eyes or even an allergic rash activates your immune system to bring more immune cells/mast cells and release more histamines which can make the allergic reaction worse.
- Use a triple therapy approach if needed – eye drops, nasal sprays and oral meds. If the allergies are affecting your ability to breathe, you need to see your doctor and maybe get inhaled medications or steroids.
Allergy wipes:
- Ocusoft Allergy wipes – works great for kids (and adults) who hate eye drops and can just wipe the itch away from the surface of their closed eyelids.
Over-the-counter allergy eye drops:
- Systane Zaditor (ketotifen 0.035%) – anti-histamine
- B&L Alaway (ketotifen 0.035%) – preservative free anti-histamine
- Opcon A (naphazoline 0.02675%-pheniramine 0.315%) – decongestant and anti-histamine
- Visine Allergy (naphazoline 0.025%-pheniramine 0.3%) – decongestant and anti-histamine
- Pataday 2x/day, Pataday 1x/day and Pataday Extra Strength – Olopatadine 0.1%, 0.2% and 0.7% (sometimes the stronger dose burns more and doesn’t help more)
- Alcaftadine (Lastacaft)
Prescription allergy eye drops:
- Cromolyn
- Elestat/Epinastine
- Steroid drops if needed
Over-the-counter nasal sprays:
- Saline Nasal spray
- Astelin or Astepro (azelastine)
- NasalCrom (cromolyn nasal spray)
Prescription allergy nasal sprays:
- Patanase
Over-the-counter oral allergy medications: (generic of all below also available)
- Loratadine (Claritin) – antihistamine
- Desloratadine (Clarinex)
- Cetirizine (Zyrtec) – antihistamine
- Levocetirizine (Xyzal) – antihistamine
- Fexofenadine (Allegra) – antihistamine
- Diphenhydramine (Benadryl)
- Chlorpheniramine
- Phenylephrine (Sudafed) – decongestant
Remember all of these likely come with a “-D” version like Claritin-D which has pseudoephedrine (a decongestant) which can make your dry eyes worse.
Prescription oral allergy medications:
- Montelukast (previously known as brand-name Singulair) – black box warning as causing worsening anxiety and sometimes nightmares.
If you’re looking for just redness relief, Lumify is safer than Visine Red Out for long term use.
Hope this post was helpful!
Happy Spring!
Photo by Skyler Ewing: https://www.pexels.com/photo/fly-sitting-on-bright-flowers-4856399/
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