Human eye drops contain ingredients that may harm dogs. For example, Visine can cause life-threatening cardiovascular and neurologic issues. The only type of “eye drops” you can safely use on your dog without a prescription are saline drops, artificial tears, and warm tap water. The wrong choice can worsen your dog’s problem or harm him.
It’s not difficult to flush out your dog’s eyes. Grab clean cotton balls or a clean washcloth and soak it with warm water to dribble into your dog’s eyes. Warm tap water can do a great job flushing out a crusty discharge in the corner of your dog’s eye.
But, even then, it’s extremely important that you know why your dog’s eye is irritated. If you flush out your dog’s eye and it’s no better—or worse!—make a veterinary visit immediately.
Of course, there are some brands of eye flushes for dogs you can use if you prefer them over saline solution. These include:
Just remember that a wrong move “treating” a dog’s eye could result in a far worse condition. Only an exam by a qualified veterinarian can get to the root cause of your dog’s eye issues, and your dog’s vision may depend on this.
If your dog has a swollen eye, call your veterinarian.
Common Eye Issues in Dogs
Some of the most common eye concerns on dogs include:
Conjunctivitis (“pink eye”): The form called dry eye or serous conjunctivitis is the most frequent type of pink eye seen in dogs. It can cause puffy and wet-appearing eyes, which causes the dog suffering from such to squint and paw at the eye, along with potentially seeing yellow or green discharge.
Eye Infections: These can be caused by many things including irritation from long hair near the eyes that needs trimmed, environmental allergies that have gone unchecked, health conditions such as immune responses as well as eye injuries such as a scratch.
Allergies: Allergies cause the same type of irritation in a dog’s eye as we humans often must deal with such as inflammation, reddening and watery discharge. Most eye irritations from allergies are environmental although a food allergy causing such is not out of the question. Learn more about dog eye allergies vs eye infections.
If your veterinarian determines your dog needs treatment for an eye problem, the choice of a medication will be based on his or her diagnosis.
Note: Since using eye drops will seem like an intrusive procedure to most dogs, ideally you will train for this with cooperative care or low stress handling.
