Is anyone familiar with this term? I have been told that I have this. Sometimes upon awakening when I open my eyes (usually the left one) the eye lid sticks to the eye ball and the pain is excruciating. The pain usually lasts for several hours and I cannot open my eye at all. It takes about two days for my vision in that eye to be restored. I apply eye drops every morning and at bedtime if my eyes feel dry. I am grateful that I only experience this perhaps 3 or 4 time a year and when it happens it's 3 or 4 times too darn many.

I assume you've been to an ophthalmologist if you're taking drops for this... but sometimes they can 'fly through' the information they give you so quickly you don't catch it all. Sounds like you need to ask him/her for something written. Corneal erosion is exactly what it sounds like. Bits of your cornea, the dome-like covering over the center/iris portion of your eye become eroded, like an abrasion. Fortunately our corneas are one of the parts of our body that heal the quickest but it can still be quite painful as you said. I think your doc may advise you to use your eyedrops MUCH more often than you do; I've seen it prescribed up to 10 times daily if you have a severe case of dry eye (a common cause for this type of corneal erosion). Even if you don't have the sensation of the eye being dry, use the lubricating drops anyway. You won't have the sensation of it being dry until it is way too far gone for one application of drops to help much. Hope this helps, good luck!

Thank you so much for your response.. The problem happened again last week and I am beginning to think that I may at times, while I sleep... my eye may be open just a slit causing it to dry on the surface of the eyeball. I seem to remember the pain was there even before I opened my eye, I washed my closed eye with the eye drops but at this point nothing helps, I was hoping the drops would seep into the eye because at this point it is way too painful to even think about opening my eye. Whatever is going on here certainly is affecting my vision in the problem eye. I do use the drops often but it doesn't seem to help one way or the other when this occurs. I can only hope that it doesn't happen more often than it does *lol*

About two years ago I had RCE, recurrent corneal erosion due to a dry eye problem. I had the same exact symptons as you and was afraid to open my eyes in the morning. I have recovered 100% and am even wearing contacts. You should see your MD asap. I was on a steady diet of Muro 128 and also had to put in ointments and numerous drops in the early stages. You are literally tearing away parts of your cornea, and they are sticking to your eyelid. Our corneas have no blood vessels so the recovery takes a long time. After I recovered I attempted to wear contacts. I was getting minor corneal abrasions. I had Punctal plugs installed and it fixed the problem. All is well now. Good luck. If you have any questions I'd be happy to answer them.

I have RCE has as well. THe first time it happened was in October. One morning I opened my eye and it felt like a knife had just stabbed it. I didn't know what happened and my vision was really blurry. That was the first time. After seeing a bunch of eye doctors, none of them could really help. I've had about 6 reoccurrences since October. And my most recent one was today. They have debrided it and I am now wearing a contact lens while it heals. The docs don't know what to do, but I will definitely bring this info about the punctal plugs to them and see what they say. The are thinking of trying an "stromal puncture"--sounds pretty barbaric to me. Or laser surgery which will correct for it. Sounds pretty aggressive. Does anyone else have any other experiences with any of these procedures or any other stories of RCE? Thanks!!

GC

As I said in my earlier post, because there is no blood supply to the cornea it takes a LONG time for it to heal. There are many layers to the cornea and the epithelium is the layer that caused my problem. It consists of cells that don't bind very tightly and are easily disturbed. I was using a drop of Muro 128 every night at bedtime for almost a year. I was afraid to come off of it for fear of another problem but I was fine when it healed. My doctor told me that there is a vision correction procedure that would have been perfect for me if it did not heal using the above treatment. I can't remember the name of it but it is the one where the top layer of the cornea is removed by laser. This was the procedure before Lasik became popular. There is a lot of info on the net. Good luck. http://www.revoptom.com/handbook/SECT3F.HTM

For information about the cornea try http://www.medhelp.org/gov/cornea.htm



[This message has been edited by barefootjan (edited 04-28-2002).]

Hi Muro128, Thanks for your post. Your story has given me hope. My doctor recommended to me the same laser procedure.. it's called PRK. It has some risk of haziness but this RCE thing has made me willing to take that risk. My last reoccurence was 2 weeks ago.. so far I am on the Muro ointment at night and 4x per day muro 128 drops 5% and no reoccurence. My eye is definitely pretty sensitive.. it still feels somewhat sensitive to the touch (i.e. when I wash my face, I have to take care not to be too rough on the side of my affected eye)

Thanks for the link too.
So quick question about the punctal plugs--did you get those because you were diagnosed with dry eyes or did they think that punctal plugs would help with lubricating your eye to prevent a corneal abrasion?

I am not sure if I have dry eyes but my other unaffected eye feels somewhat scratchy everymorning i wake up.

GC

You're welcome GC, and I wish you luck. Just remember it will probably take longer than you'd like but hopefully you'll recover fully. My MD was very good at treating my RCE problem. Muro 128 is the standard tx for cornea problems like ours. It is actually sodium cloride and it draws liquid? from the eye and as you know, provides a nice lubrication to keep things from sticking. My MD gave me permission to discontinue the Muro 128 when I recovered but I was reluctant to do it. My MD said that I should not have RCE again and said sometimes it just happens. I waited about 3 months after I was 100% OK and then received permission from my MD to wear contacts. I went to my optamologist and the contact lens person never did the test to see if I had enough moisture to wear contacts. I wore them sucessfully for a few weeks and then kept getting minor corneal abrasions. The MD who treated my RCE so wonderfully did not know why I could not wear contacts. I kind of bugged him about it and he referred me to a cornea specialist. The specialist told me about three minutes into the exam that my problem was only dryness. He suggested collagen puntpal plugs to see if I liked them. They worked perfectly with the contacts and I had permanant plugs installed in my lower eye lids. That was two years ago and things are still fine. I work in an office that is very dry. I began wearing contacts "full time" now for the past month and all is well. I use rewetting drops more at work than at home. Even if I did not wear contacts I think I would feel more comfortable with having the plugs in. I do not want RCE again and I'm not positive that it could not happen again. Hopefully, GC you've got a good cornea specialist and will recover. Hang in there.