What over-the-counter eye solutions should I use to treat dry eyes?
There is a number of over-the-counter products that are useful for dry eyes and they generally divide into preserved and non-preserved. The preserved come in bottles with a cap on it. You can take it off and put it in your eyes. They have preservatives in them and that means they are meant to be used over and over. Preservatives themselves can irritate the eyes. So if you are using them more than three or four times a day you should stay away from the preserved artificial tears because more than three or four times a day the preservative starts to build up. So, in that case, you want to use the non preserved kind. These are little break open containers that contain just a single dose or a couple of doses of artificial lubricants. These are very nice because they are preservative free. They won't irritate the eyes at all, it is a pure soothing effect. The disadvantages are considerably more expensive because you have to, at least you are supposed to, break it open, use it and throw it away. Take the next one, break it open and throw it away. Now, what the companies don't tell you is you can reuse those and you can pretty much use it all day long but you should certainly throw it away and open a new one at least once every day because without a preservative they will tend to accumulate bacteria over time. It's easy to tell the difference between the preserved and the non-preserved artificial tears because the preserved ones come in a bottle with a screw on cap and the non-preserved ones come in little break open containers.
