Cold meds for dry eye patients

[frwbeach]

My dry eye is treatable with Celluvisc and Refresh Gel drops and like all with dry eye ( moderate and above ) there are good and bad days--However I have run into a difficult situation related to the common cold. What meds can I take that will not effect my dry eye ???? I recently had a cold and took cold meds and my eyes burnt so bad ( even with drops ) that it was near unbearable . The Doc and  Pharmacy both said it was the antihistomine and I quit the meds which relieved the dry eye symptoms.
I asked my eye doc and pharmacy and they said they were not aware of any meds that would treat cold symptoms without effecting my dry eyes. They say the problem is I am limited due to my high blood pressure as to what I can take.  I would imagine anyone with mod to severe dry eye would have the same problem----

Any ideas for meds ???  Doc says pain reliever- tissues and rest - is there an alternative they may have missed??

[Michael J Kutryb, MD]

Now remember, I cannot give you personal recommendations on how to treat your illness.  But in general, with severe dry eyes you want to avoid the ingredients of diphenhydramine (benadryl) or phenyephrine/pseudophedrine (sudafed), brompheniramine (bromfed) because they will worsen your dry eyes.  Basically its the decongestants that can worsen dry eyes and blood pressure and the antihistamines that will worsen dry eyes.  You may be able to use a once a day antihistamine like claritin or zyrtec which have fewer systemic side effects.  Also guifenasin (robitussin or mucinex)which loosens the secrections in throat and chest can be helpful with colds without affecting dry eyes so much. Just some general comments - discuss situation with your doctor to see of claritin and mucinex might be something that you could possibly take without affecting dry eyes too much.

MJK MD

[frwbeach]

Thanks--Will try next time.