EP#28 Dr. Angeline Simeus Reveals Secrets to Conquering Dry Eye Syndrome
May 14, 2024
Didier Nicholas
Ever find yourself blinking excessively, hoping to soothe that uncomfortable, gritty sensation in your eyes? You're not alone, and the relief you seek might be closer than you think. Dive into our latest conversation with Dr. Angelique Simeus and Joe from Sure Vision Centers of Florida, where we explore the misunderstood realm of dry eye syndrome. Dr. Simeus, a seasoned expert in the field, sheds light on the myriad of treatments beyond the quick fix of over-the-counter artificial tears. She discusses the significance of addressing underlying inflammatory conditions, such as Sjogren's disease or rosacea, and the role of prescription eye drops tailored to combat these issues.
But it's not all about the drops! In our discussion, Dr. Simeus emphasizes the profound impact of our daily habits on eye health. Learn why chugging water and embracing omega-3-rich foods or supplements could be the unsung heroes in your battle against dry eyes. Whether you're a die-hard seafood enthusiast or someone who can't stand the thought of a fishy feast, this episode offers valuable insights into simple lifestyle modifications that can help keep your peepers comfortable and hydrated. So, tune in to give your eyes the attention they deserve and kick that dryness to the curb! For more information visit https://surevisionfl.com/ or Call (407) 964-8665
Ever find yourself blinking excessively, hoping to soothe that uncomfortable, gritty sensation in your eyes? You're not alone, and the relief you seek might be closer than you think. Dive into our latest conversation with Dr. Angelique Simeus and Joe from Sure Vision Centers of Florida, where we explore the misunderstood realm of dry eye syndrome. Dr. Simeus, a seasoned expert in the field, sheds light on the myriad of treatments beyond the quick fix of over-the-counter artificial tears. She discusses the significance of addressing underlying inflammatory conditions, such as Sjogren's disease or rosacea, and the role of prescription eye drops tailored to combat these issues.
But it's not all about the drops! In our discussion, Dr. Simeus emphasizes the profound impact of our daily habits on eye health. Learn why chugging water and embracing omega-3-rich foods or supplements could be the unsung heroes in your battle against dry eyes. Whether you're a die-hard seafood enthusiast or someone who can't stand the thought of a fishy feast, this episode offers valuable insights into simple lifestyle modifications that can help keep your peepers comfortable and hydrated. So, tune in to give your eyes the attention they deserve and kick that dryness to the curb! For more information visit https://surevisionfl.com/ or Call (407) 964-8665
Speaker 1:
This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, DDA Nicholas.
Speaker 2:
Hello everyone, my name is DDA Nicholas. I'm the host of the Good Neighbor Podcast and I am so excited to bring back Dr Simeon St Joe with Sure Vision Centers of Florida, and we have a great episode we're actually going to kind of share with you, with our listeners, and this episode is going to discuss the dry eye treatment and the underlying cause and severity of this condition and, with that being said, I'm going to let them. I'll start with Dr Simias, if you want to kind of talk about that, and then Joseph, feel free to you know, jump in.
Speaker 3:
All right, well, as you said, I'm Dr Angelique Simeon and, in terms of dry eye, it looks like we were just going to talk about just the normal treatment options that people typically know about, and maybe some more advanced options that they're not aware of, in order to really treat dry eye and the causes of dry eye I like that and you know and I was kind of looking at this too on my end and there's so many different uh topics or things you can expand on when it comes to the prescription eye drops, you know, artificial tears, anti-inflammatory medications, warm compresses and eyelid massage all these things actually nutritional too.
Speaker 2:
Right plays a big, big part of this as well exactly so.
Speaker 3:
what people know and generally go for are the artificial tears, and I know there's been some articles and some news stories as of late that make people a little weary of artificial tears manufactured here in the US. The ones that are manufactured here, like Refresh and Sustain the BioTruth, those are made here in the US. Those are usually not ones to worry about. I do like artificial tears for temporary issues, not necessarily for chronic, long-term dry eye, not necessarily a treatment, it's more of a temporary relief that you can get. So that, I think, is one of the things that commonly people don't really realize. They think that they're doing something for their dry eye, but not necessarily.
Speaker 2:
oh, that's interesting. And and what about prescription eye drops? How does that come into play?
Speaker 3:
mm-hmm. So there are a couple different prescription eye drops. Usually it's either the patient has something that is autoimmune, like Sjogren's disease, or one of the other conditions that causes inflammation in the eyes, or they can have rosacea. So generally we use the prescribed medications for those types of conditions, as well as something as simple as allergies. Allergies can cause inflammation in the eyes as well. That lead to the dryness. So when we use those medications like Restasis Cydra, we're targeting that inflammation that is on the eye itself. It's not necessarily a good choice for people who don't have those conditions, but for people who do, it's a great option.
Speaker 2:
And you know, when it comes to medications right, anti-inflammatory medications we kind of talked a little bit about that Lifestyle. You know, I guess the way that you do your day-to-day could also affect that too. Could you give us some examples of that?
Speaker 3:
Sure, yeah. So if you're not taking in enough water, then in general, you're going to be dehydrated, and so whenever you're dehydrated, then your eyes will be more dry as well. So we do need enough aqueous, which is the liquid part of our tears, and then the eyes become dry. The other part is having sufficient omega threes.
Speaker 2:
So I was about. I was about to say that too, because you get omega threes from fish, right From salmon and other other fish as well, but I was about to go into that too, so you kind of beat me to it. So let's talk a little bit about that. Let's talk about oh, that's awesome, omega threes. Let's kind of talk a little bit about that.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, so we do get it from fish, right. But if you're like myself and don't really eat fish Joseph doesn't like fish much either you can take supplements.
Speaker 4:
Which are necessary.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, so you take supplements like omega-3s. There are tons out there on the market. We have some that we recommend to patients as well in our office part of the MacuHealth family that we tend to recommend to patients in order to make sure that they're getting the right amount of omega-3s and other vitamins that support good, healthy eyes so that you don't have so much dryness.
Speaker 2:
Now let me ask you this does the weather play into this? If you're in a cold climate or a warm climate, like allergies?
Speaker 3:
It does. It does so here in Florida in particular. We have a lot of allergens that are out there. If it's a rainy day and you're allergic to mold, if it's a sunny day and you're allergic to grass like there's so many different things that we can be allergic to here in particular in Florida, that people tend to have allergies, and because it's warm, basically year round, those allergies never really give us a break. We're basically having seasonal allergies year round. So very important in terms of the weather, the environment, knowing your triggers, I would say. A lot of my patients I tend to co-manage with their primary doctors or their allergy specialists just to kind of figure out the root cause of their allergies so that we can really get to solving their dry eye issues.
Speaker 2:
Oh, I like that. So you're really kind of sitting there and diagnosing the issues that they have and then coming up with a remedy for them as well, correct?
Speaker 3:
Yes because we don't want temporary solutions for dry eye. We want the person to feel full, real relief from their dry eye. It is going to be a lifelong thing, there's no real way around that, but we can try to at least make them not feel those dry, gritty, dandy feeling eyes all the time.
Speaker 2:
Okay, that's pretty interesting as well. What about warm compresses and eyelid massage?
Speaker 3:
compresses in eyelid massage, eyelid I would never think I would be asking about eyelid massage. I've never. So inside of our eyelids we have our meibomian glands, so these are glands that secrete oil. So I didn't tell you and I probably should have at the start of this that our tears are made up of three layers the liquid, which is the aqueous that I touched on earlier. The mucus, which comes from the eye itself, the surface of the eye and oil, which comes from those oil glands. So every time we blink, all three layers are spread evenly on the eye, as long as you have all three layers in the amount that you're supposed to right. So in terms of the warm compresses and eyelid massage that is supposed to target specifically those meibomian glands that are in the eyelids. So the majority of dry eye, as we know it today, for the people who are suffering from dry eye, comes from meibomian gland dysfunction. So 85% of dry eye sufferers it's because of their eyelids.
Speaker 3:
Oh wow, yes. So the warm compresses, the eyelid massage, all of that is targeted towards those eyelids to try to get those oils to come out nice and clean and smooth and just support the tears and allow people to not have that dryness. So warm compresses and eyelid massage are a great place to start, as long as you don't have any blockages in your glands, and when you do, you come in office basically for that.
Speaker 2:
So we've got a couple more questions, or I've got a couple more questions. Before we wrap this up, let's talk about age.
Speaker 3:
Does age, does age, have something to do with this, as, as you know, as you get older, or so if you I guess we can look at it from all the different parts of the tears and the dryness right. So you have the people that don't have sufficient aqueous, which is that liquid, right? So with age, over time, our bodies and everything just become drier. So that does tend to affect how dry the eyes are. For women in particular, as we get older, towards menopause, that also starts to cause changes in our tears and the dryness of the eyes as well. And then in terms of the oil glands.
Speaker 3:
So if you imagine that you've had issues with your oil glands from the time that you were young, as you get older, those problems, if not treated properly in office by an optometrist or an ophthalmologist, then by the time you get older those problems are only more severe. So now, instead of feeling like your eyes are dry, gritty, sandy, burning some of the time, maybe you feel it all the time. Maybe your eyes are always weepy, Maybe they just always feel heavy or tired, Because over time that issue that might have been small at once is now a really big problem that issue that might've been small at once is now a really big problem.
Speaker 2:
So, as we wrap up here, what is the one thing that you want to leave our listeners with? That kind of stand out when we, when we speak about dry eye?
Speaker 3:
So I'm going to give Joseph a chance.
Speaker 2:
He's been kind of quiet a little bit.
Speaker 3:
So when we do the dry eye evaluations in the office, he is the one who is spearheading a good portion of that, so I'll leave him to talk about the dry eye evaluation and all that.
Speaker 4:
Yeah, so with the evaluation overall, we're just looking to go and make sure that the glands are in good working condition. We want to check the overall health of the eye, make sure that we can go and look at all the different causes or the parameters for somebody that would be a good candidate for the drive treatments, and then, once we go through the list of things that we're looking for to see if they are good candidates to go and get the treatment, then we go and create a plan. Dr Simias then will go and direct a course of treatment and then we do a follow-up just to make sure that their eyes are taken care of as best as possible. One of the biggest things that we're always, you know, they're consistently saying patients who have had surgery LASIK, PRK they're most likely going to be a candidate for dry eyes, they're most likely going to be a candidate for dry eyes. Somebody that is suffering from pollen, suffering from, you know, pet dander, from hay fever, like all these different things that we see in Florida most likely going to be a candidate for dry eye.
Speaker 4:
And then just a lot of time that people that spend a lot of time in the sun, which a lot of people love to go to the beach, especially around the central Florida area. We're going to go and see a lot of people love to go to the beach, especially around the central Florida area. We're going to go and see a lot of people that are coming down and you know factors that are affecting it are the weather, the humidity, age, all the things that you already brought up. So when we do the evaluation, we look to go and see how we can best treat and give people relief from something that they've been suffering for probably a very long time, and our goal is to make sure that they can leave better off than when they came in.
Speaker 2:
Well, guys, thank you so much for providing our listeners with great information on dry eye treatment and again, it's a pleasure having you guys back and looking forward to doing this again and having you guys come back and speak about something else in the near future.
Speaker 3:
All right, thank you.
Speaker 2:
Thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1:
Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gnpwindermerecom. That's gnpwindermerecom. That's gnpwindermerecom. Or call 407-783-8320.