i can get v bad dry eyes in the morning whenever i wake up fron sleep and it literally feels like i am ripping my eyes open. on my 3 month follow up i have been told that this is actually kinda true whereby the optometrist said what she thinks is happening is that the when the scrape away the layer of cells to conduct the surgery and scrap it back over again, this hasnt healed properly and so is quite 'weak'. so eyes dry out and get when i wake up and open my eyes it is literally ripping these cells again.

this doesnt happen every morning and is more like once every week or two however it is extremely painful when it happens and is sore throughout the day. it also affects my vision and eyesight goes blurry. but this goes back to normal after a day.

after it happens and i close my eyes i can literally feel where it is on my eye that is sort (its the top of the eye) everywhere else of my eye feels ok however the top is v sore.

the optometrist said that after my my check up in another 3 months time that if it is still the same i may need to have the cells scraped away again and put back in order to have another go at healing them (basically the epi lasek surgery all over again but without the laser).

Has anyone ever had that done? did it work? does anyone have the same problems?

during the day my eyes dont feel dry at all and it is only when i wake up from sleep (even if i've only had an hours sleep).

it doesnt happen every time but i always make sure i put refresh drops in my eyes on waking just in case as they are normally a bit dry. i also use lacrilube before i go to bed (a lubricant for the eye) and have recently just started using viscotears but even with all these measure i have still 'ripped' my open.

any advice or similar experiences would be welcome.

FYI i had the epi lasek surgery without wavefront and apart from the dry eye and blurry vision when i do 'rip' my eyes, my eyesight is fine

Remember I am not a doctor but here is my 2p's worth.

In case you are wondering I very much doubt it is related to the fact that you did not have wavefront.

It sounds like you have a problem with the epithelium, which is the very outer layer of the eye. This is gently removed and replaced during EPI-LASEK surgery.

The outer surface of the cornea is covered with fast-growing, easily-regenerated epithelial cells which normally replenish themselves within a few days.

This is why the recovery time takes longer than LASIK as these cells are not disturbed so much with LASIK.

Your case sounds unusual to me (but maybe not to an optom who specialises in epi-lasek aftercare). I do know that sometimes people do have on going problems with dry eye. Unfortunately the best method to fix it is to give it time which I can understand is very frustrating when you have this type of problem.

The optoms are very experienced in dealing with aftercare so if resetting the epithelium has been suggested then I would have thought it was the normal course of action for this problem.

I think that your dry eye will eventually go away, I hope that its sooner rather than later of course.

Hope this is helpful

thanks

Nick

Head of Technology
Optimax