Tips For Safely Using Antibiotic Eye Drops After Your Cataract Surgery

To prevent an eye infection during the week after your cataract surgery, your ophthalmologist will prescribe some antibiotic eye drops for you to use. You will need to place the drops into your eyes as often as instructed on the bottle and take extra precautions to avoid contaminating the end of the eye drop bottle's application tip with bacteria.

Here are some tips to help you safely use antibiotic eye drops following your cataract surgery:

Prevent Contact with the Medication Bottle's Application Tip

When you place the antibiotic drops into your eyes, you need to hold the bottle a couple inches above your eye to prevent bacteria from your eye getting onto the applicator tip. If bacteria from your hands or eyes gets on the tip, it will grow and could lead to infections as you continue to use the contaminated bottle.

The best way to get eye drops into your eye is to use one hand to hold your eyelid open while you hold the open dropper bottle in the other hand.

Apply Eye Drops One at a Time

If you need to put two drops into each of your eyes, then you may be tempted to drop both into your eyes at a time. However, you should always place just one drop into your eye at a time. Let the drop sit on your eye for a couple minutes before you add another drop. A good practice to follow is to drop into your left eye, then your right eye, and then repeat the process. This will give each drop time to work and it will prevent the medication from simply flooding your eye and running down into your tear ducts.

Cover the Tear Duct in Your Eye to Prevent Medication Drainage

Finally, as soon as you have placed an eye drop into your eye, then place your clean finger over the tear duct in that eye socket. The tear ducts are located in your eye socket where it contacts with the side of your nose.

Once you have plugged the tear duct, then close your eyelid and allow the antibiotic medication to absorb into your eye as it is designed to do. Covering your tear duct will keep the medication in your eye, and even if your eyes water from applying the drops, the medication will stay in your eye better if it cannot leave via the tear duct passageways.

For more information about undergoing or recovering from cataract surgery, contact a doctor like Thomas L. Lawrence, M.D., P.A.

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