Conjunctivitis Treatment in Singapore

Viral and bacterial conjunctivitis are, and easily. They pass on hands, towels, pillowcases and anything else a rubbed eye has touched, which is why it moves through a household or a classroom. Allergic conjunctivitis is not. It is a reaction to something you are around, and nobody catches it from you. Which one you have is the first thing to settle, and it is usually readable from how the eye behaves.

Usually not. Most conjunctivitis is viral, and antibiotic drops do not treat a viral or an allergic conjunctivitis. They are for the bacterial kind, which is the sticky one, and even then they are not always needed. Taking drops you do not need costs you money, irritates the surface and does nothing for the eye, so the useful step is finding out which of the three it is first.

A viral one usually gets worse for a few days before it turns the corner, and settles over a week or two. The second eye often joins in partway through. A bacterial one tends to improve faster once it is being treated. An allergic one lasts as long as whatever is setting it off is still around. An eye that is still getting worse after a week, rather than slowly better, is worth having looked at.

Not while it is contagious. With a bacterial or viral conjunctivitis the advice is to stay home until the eye is no longer red with discharge; an allergic one is safe to carry on with as normal.

Discharge is the divider. Conjunctivitis produces something: watery, or sticky enough to glue the lids by morning. The infectious kinds may start in one eye. Dry eye is gritty and burning, affects both eyes fairly evenly, is worse by evening and on screens, and the vision softens between blinks. A dry eye can look pink by the end of the day without being infected at all.

The viral and bacterial kinds come from contact: a hand, a towel, a shared pillow, a lens case. A cold going round often brings the viral one with it. The allergic kind is not caught: it is a reaction to dust mites, pets, pollen or an irritant in the air. Rubbing is how a one-eye problem becomes a two-eye problem, and how it reaches the people you live with.

Lasting damage is uncommon. The great majority of conjunctivitis is a surface problem that clears without leaving anything behind, and blurring that comes and goes with the discharge is the discharge, not the eye. The uncommon exception is an infection that reaches the cornea rather than staying on the surface, which is why real pain, a dislike of light or vision that has genuinely dropped is examined rather than waited out.

No — stop until the eye is completely settled. A lens holds whatever is on the surface against the eye, slows the healing and can turn a surface infection into something deeper. Throw away the lenses you were wearing when it started and the case with them, and start the new pair only when the redness and discharge have gone. If you wear monthlies, your optician can usually advise on replacing the pair.

Redness across the white of the eye, discharge of some kind, and a gritty feeling rather than a deep ache. Lids stuck together on waking point at the bacterial kind, watering and a recent cold at the viral one, and itch with puffy lids at allergy. The viral and bacterial kinds may start in one eye and reach the other a few days later; allergy affects both from the start.

Often, yes, and it is one of the better uses of a video call. How it started, what the discharge looks like, whether one eye or both, whether anyone around you has it and whether you wear lenses is most of what decides the answer, and the eye itself is visible on camera in a way a deeper problem is not. A video consultation can start treatment the same day and says whether you need to be seen in person.