Q: I am a 28 years old girl suffering from a repetitive eye infections for the last 3 months on the upper eyelid of the left eye. I took Augmentin 625 mg and Zanocin eye drops for 10 days. Meanwhile, the infection spread to the lower eyelid of my right eye. I continued the eye drops but the infection on the right eye was contagious and spread from one place to another. So, I consulted another doctor and he diagnosed it as stye. He prescribed Novaclox for 5 days. After the medicine, the infection re-appeared on another place in the same eye, so the doctor told me to take Dioxycycline 100 mg for two weeks along with Dudrop and Gatiquin eye drops. The infection subsided within 2 weeks and in the meantime I developed a fresh infection on the lower eyelid of the left eye. Why is this infection occurring again and again? What precautions should I take to prevent this?

A:The main cause of eye lid infections is rubbing the eyes when you are tired specially due to eye strain which is more common if you need glasses due to refractive error and/or over use of your eyes either as such or poor lighting conditions or holding your work too close to your eyes. Get your eyes checked to see whether you need any glasses, make sure lighting conditions are good and also hold your work at reasonable distance from your eyes. You do not need any systemic antibiotics. Try to clean your eye lids margins with cotton bud and Johnson’s baby shampoo twice daily and then hot spoon bathing i.e. place small amount of cotton wool in hot water and while it is warm and bearable to skin, place it in the spoon and hot foment the affected eye lid. Make sure you do not burn the skin. If pus is visible at the root of the eye lash, you can pull it out, squeeze the pus out but never rub your eyes again. Apply antibiotic eye ointment at bed time. Your eyes will get better in few days. Germs are on the skin of your hands and on the lids.