eye swelling and itching

[munuba]

Its already been three weeks, one of my eyes always gets irritated and itches a lot all the time. The upper eyelid has swellen and its getting red for a long time. every morning i wake up, the infected eye looks the same and i think it looks worse. Also the skin on the upper eyelids are cracked and very dry. Some sort of dried and cracked skin and that itches. I have been using benedryl and  and putting visin for drops but its not helping. now the lower lid is also infected. it itches a lot. I m very worried.

[John C Hagan III, MD, FACS, FAAO]

See a different "eye doctor" one that is a Eye MD ophthalmologist for a second opinion.

JCH MD

[NLGIL]

This fall my eyes have gone in cycles of peeling, exposing raw skin, peeling again and eventually getting swollen. I have been to the eye doctor and she gave me a steroid cream to put on them. It clears it up, but as soon as I stop using the cream it comes back in a couple of days. I tried petrolyum jelly and that helped keep it away for a few days. Is there anything else I should be doing?

NLG IL

[John C Hagan III, MD, FACS, FAAO]

Benadryl will just dry the eyes and is not helpful. You can try warm compresses and artificial tears (Systane, Soothe, Refresh, etc). For the dry cracked lid skin use Refresh-PM.  All of these are over the counter. If it persists see an eye MD. Find one at www.aao.org

JCH MD