Do I Need Preservative-Free Artificial Tears?

Is there anything more challenging in life than trying to choose artificial tears?! Well, probably 😆, but trying to navigate the artificial tear world is up on the list. It’s pretty accurate that us eye doctors recommend artificial tears for just about everything. Because of that, dozens of manufacturers have each come out with dozens of solutions for our artificial tear needs. The major distinction (and the most important when talking about artificial tears after lasik) is preservative-based and preservative-free artificial tears.

Most eye drops come in small bottles. These bottles are opened and stay open for a few months at a time. To prevent bacteria from growing in the bottles, preservatives are added. These are chemicals that kill bacteria before they can start growing. While these chemicals are “safe” for the eye, it isn’t healthy to constantly bathe the eye in preservatives. These chemicals when used frequently or prolonged can cause irritation to the surface of the eye. This irritation causes the eyes to dry out more. Thus, if you were to use artificial tears with preservatives greater than 4-6 times a day, you will actually cause more problems on your eyes.

Enter preservative-free artificial tears. To combat the irritation from the preservatives, these type of artificial tears simply don’t use a preservative. Well, how do these tears prevent bacteria from growing? The trick is that these tears don’t stay open very long. When you buy a 30 day supply of preservative-free artificial tears, you get 30 different containers or vials of artificial tears. Each vial is small and doesn’t last very long and thus there isn’t enough time for bacteria to grow. (You will find some bottles actually contain preservative-free artificial tears. These particular bottles actually have special valves on them in order to keep the eye drops clean.) Preservative-free tears are the perfect artificial tears when you are attempting to treat bad dry eye or when you need to take artificial tears frequently (such as after a laser eye surgery). Unlike the other type, these preservative-free artificial tears can be taken up to every hour!

When looking in your local drug-store, keep on the lookout for artificial tears labeled preservative-free. If you need to take artificial tears on a frequent basis, this is what you want. Otherwise, you can pick up almost any other type of artificial tear.

Related Articles