Sore Eye Problems in Pets

Every year we are presented with animals with sore eye problems – in some cases, the animal can not even open their eyelids, and in others, the animal is squinting when in bright light, others are rubbing their eyes and some have a heavy discharge.

There are a number of ways your pet will show you that there is something wrong – by the way that animals do NOT show an eye problem is they do not whinge and whine about the pain. The act of vocalising about pain is a human trait and usually does not happen in the animal kingdom.

I have no doubts that there are a few animals that will cry, howl, whine and carry on as if their throats have been cut with a rusty blunt blade, but these animals are the exceptions and not the norm.

Animals talk by body language – they do not lie and they do not look for sympathy as a general rule. By observing your animal then you can get a general idea of when there is a problem and when everything is fine.

• If you are cleaning your animals eye each morning but for the rest of the day, the animal shows no sign of discharge.
• If the animal is not showing any signs of pain or discomfort when in bright light.
• If the animal is not rubbing the eye with its paw.
• If the area around the eye is not reddened.

Then there is a good chance there is not a problem with the eye.

If you are getting worried about your pet’s eyes, then my recommendation is to contact us and ask for advice. If your pet is in pain or great discomfort then ring and make an appointment as soon as you can.

DO NOT wash out the eye in salted water – this only irritates the sensitive tissues even further. If you feel that you need to wash the eye out, then either use warm water and a clean cloth – or use milk at room temperature. In this case, it is important that you wash any residue of milk off the hair to stop the hair from caking and potentially causing further problems

Eyes are very precious organs and you do not get many chances to get the problem fixed before the problem becomes permanent. We treat eye cases as being urgent (not critical unless the animal won’t let you open their eyelids at all) – this means that we advise that these cases need to be seen within a short time of the problem becoming obvious