If you wake up every morning with dry, gritty eyes, talk to an ophthalmologist about your problem. You could have a condition known as dry eye, and sometimes the symptoms get worse at night. Your ophthalmologist can recommend treatments that help. Here are some causes of dry eye at night and some treatments that may help.
Reasons Your Eyes Get Dry At Night
A number of things cause dry eye, and specifically dry eyes at night. The problem could be medications you take before bed. Your eyes might also get dry from reading screens all day and by nighttime, your eyes could feel gritty and dry. The cause of your nighttime eye dryness might also be an eyelid problem that keeps your lids from closing and forming a tight seal as you sleep.
Medical Treatments For Nighttime Eye Dryness
If you have problems with dry eyes during the day or night, see an ophthalmologist for a diagnosis and treatment. Your eye doctor may recommend prescription eye drops to use throughout the day or before bed. You might need to use eye ointment at night. The ointment is thick, so it blurs your vision, but it also holds in moisture while you sleep.
In some cases, surgery can help dry eyes. The surgery might be done on your eyelids to help the lids get a tight seal, or the surgery might involve your tear ducts or other structures in your eyes.
Home Treatments For Dry Eyes At Night
Your ophthalmologist might also recommend home treatments that help your eyes stay moist. These could include running a humidifier in your bedroom, wearing sleeping goggles that hold humidity inside and block dry air, using warm compresses on your eyes, and taking supplements designed to combat eye dryness.
You might also try wearing a sleeping mask that holds your eyelids in place so your eyes stay closed at night. Limiting the amount of time you spend looking at screens in the evening might also help. Your ophthalmologist might also want you to limit the use of contacts which can cause your eyes to feel dry and irritated.
Eye dryness makes you feel uncomfortable, and it may cause you to rub your eyes during sleep and make the condition worse. An eye doctor has treatments that can help, and you may also need to uncover the cause of your dry eyes so you can treat the underlying condition that's keeping your eyes so dry. This could mean you might have to manage your prescription medications, control a medical condition, or keep air from leaking around a CPAP mask while you sleep.
For more information about dry eye treatment, contact an eye doctor.
