Blog vol 2. 47. Happy Spring!
Spring. With the warmer weather and more sun, comes the return of the birds and the greening of our backyards and parks. And, if you are an allergy sufferer, you start breaking out in sneezes and itchy eyes in anticipation.
Just new to the eye care industry is a contact lens that is drug-eluted with an antihistamine. The good people at Johnson & Johnson have developed the first and only contact lens that has an embedded, slow-releasing drug that helps with allergies.
The lens is called Theravision; it is a daily contact lens that has ketotifen, a combination antihistamine and mast cell stabilizer, that works immediately to alleviate seasonal allergy symptoms. The eluted lens releases the drug over the day lasting up to 12 hours, and as an added benefit, it has no preservatives.
This is a paradigm shift in allergy treatment.
As I discuss the lens with people that have allergies, they are initially reluctant to wear these lenses. Too good to be true? Like, what do you mean, I can have my cake and eat it too? The answer is yes. Currently if a person wants relief from allergies, they use an eye drop and stay away from contact lenses. The drop lasts for much of the day, but not all day, and has a preservative that can irritate the eye. The result is tolerable relief, the patient needs to wear their glasses, no contacts, and repeat the eye drops as needed.
If you are an allergy sufferer and want to wear your contact lenses, the Theravision lens is worth a try. Finally, a solution to the itchy, irritated eyes of spring (and just around the corner, summer and late summer…).
til next week,
the good doctor, Dr. Mark Germain, Burlington optometrist
