Howdy
I am wondering if anyone has experience with dry eyes? The vets have my 7 yr old boy Buster on artificial tears and Optimmune (cyclosporine) after healing the ulcers. He still has very one painful eye, and I am wondering what the future holds.
Thanks for any info you may be able to share.
Make sure they have checked and ruled out uveitis and glacoma - both are nasty.
No glaucoma. The ulcers were nasty; but at least they healed.
Uveitis - is very serious and has ulcerations in the eye.
My OJ in the last months he was with us developed this…. it was very nasty... and made his vision like looking through very, very dirty glasses... while the ulcers mostly healed... he never could see well after that. But he was 17+ when they developed
I know that they can do surgery for them if they get really bad and while it was an option.. at his age... is was not an option to me as long as we could keep him comfortable.
Has this been seen by a specialist?
My Nicky, 11, has had 1 deep ulceration and another large but shallow ulceration in the last year. Both have healed, slowly, but we will most likely need to use eye drops and ointment probably forever. Her eye's tear production is only slightly low, but I flush her eyes after the dog park, and usually use ointment at night . Her animal ophthamologist is an amazing man, he does all these terrible things to her eyes just talking to her and petting her! He told me he went to a seminar last year and they discussed corneal ulcerations and said that 2 breeds in particular seem to heal slower than others, one of those breeds was basenji. They do eventually heal, but slowly, for no particular reason.
He gives me "Tears Again" liquid gel for eye drops, it is thicker than most of the eye drops, and plain old puralube ointment. (We used antibiotic ointment for the first month or so).
Fortunately both eyes have healed and her vision seems to be fine. Good luck with Buster!
Oh, the instruction my vet gave me is to put just the tip of the ointment-tube in hot water for about 10 seconds, it melts what's in the tip and it just drops into the eye and spreads out, much more comfortable for the dog than squeezing a big glop of goo into the eye. I gave myself a small corneal abrasion last week and tired both methods of using ointment and the warm, liquified stuff was like liquid velvet on my painful eye, so I can say firsthand that it is worth the extra effort!
Oh, I hope you can find some relief for your b's eyes.
What an awful condition.
He has been seen by two different veterinary ophthalmologists. The first said his eyes were fine (he was still having good days last year), and the second one did two different procedures. We went to the local vet yesterday as his eye was bad again after two weeks, and there were almost no tears in his eyes. He said to give the drops more often and I can give pain meds if he needs it. Even the artificial tears burn his eyes and he wants to rub. It is so sad.
Miles is now in a cone because his ointment led him to put his foot in his eye and make things worse. 
I will try the hot-water method you guys described. Hopefully that will help him.
