Thousands of Albertans live with dry eye. We can help relieve your dry eye’s frustrating symptoms.

For many Albertans, dry is is a chronic and painful condition. For others, it comes and goes intermittently and for seemingly no reason. Working together, we will help you determine the cause of your dry eye and help you to manage its symptoms and improve your quality of life.

Alberta, with an arid climate and high altitudes, is a hub where dry eye flourishes. As dry eye is often influenced by allergens and ambient air quality, we see a lot of people in Grande Prairie with dry eye symptoms- especially in the cold winter months.

Today there are a variety of effective treatments for dry eye. The continuous improvement of available technology as well as a greater understanding of dry eye and its causes has resulted in many different types of effective treatment.

Visit us for help with your dry eye symptoms. We will work with you to determine the cause and find the best way to treat and manage its symptoms.


More Information About Dry Eye

What Is Dry Eye?

When your body is unable to properly lubricate your eye, the resulting condition is called dry eye. This lack of lubrication may be due to your body not producing enough tears, or the tears the body does produce being of poor quality (they evaporate too quickly).

Diagnosing Dry Eye

To diagnose dry eye, we examine the eye carefully during a comprehensive exam. We may be able to diagnose your dry eye right away, or we may require the use of more specialised tests (such as the Schirmer test) to determine tear quantity and quality.

Treating Dry Eye

A range of treatments are available. Depending on the severity of your dry eye, treatment can involve using eye drops or employing advanced technologies to relieve symptoms.


Treating Dry Eye

Treating Dry Eye With Drops

The most common “first step” in treating dry eye, lubricating eye drops (also called artificial tears) are used to provide lubrication for the eye. We recommend the use of preservative free eye drops to avoid any irritation from chemical preservatives in the eye drops.

We can also provide medicated eye drops that have anti inflammatories or antihistamines in them.

Treating Dry Eye With Medication

Dry eye can also be treated with medication, such as corticosteroids and restasis. In the case of corticosteroids, they are used to relieve inflammation in the eye/eyelid. However, they cannot be used long term due to their influence on the development of glaucoma.

Restasis facilities the body’s natural production of tears over the period of weeks and months. Restasis is used (in the form of eye drops) twice daily, with maximum effects after six months.

Punctal Plugs

Punctal plugs are placed inside the tear ducts, preventing tears from naturally draining via the ducts. This forces tears to stay on the eye longer, providing greater lubrication.