Gunky eye

[mummy20182021]

My son is now coming up 4 months and since around a week old he has had a gunky left eye. It leeks yellow discharge and constantly has tears running down from that eye which makes me think it can't be a blocked tear duct? I clean it with sterile water all the time but nothing seems to help. I mentioned it to the doctor at his 8 week check and the doctor barely looked at it but said it's probably a blocked tear duct and he will grow out of it...

Just looking for any advice really because it's driving me insane (luckily doesn't seem to bother him).

Many thanks!

Could be a blocked tear duct. My DS had the same & I remember being certain that it must be infected because of the gunk, but I was told by the dr that actually tears aren't just water, but lubricant/oils etc also so this is just building up. Ours did eventually clear. That said, I would check with the dr again in case it is an infection. Sorry not v helpful!

Yeah, that might take a while. dDs eye is starting to clear up and she's almost 11 months. A friends dd also took about a year before her eye was clear. It's just one of those things.

Yes, I’d get it looked at again for your peace of mind.
A ‘probably’ diagnosis isn’t really good enough, if he wasn’t sure it wouldn’t have hurt to swab it.

Blocked tear ducts cause watery eyes as the tears can't drain away.

Sometimes massage can help. Below is a good explanation of how to do it, ignore the medicine part, we don't usually medicate for blocked tear ducts in the UK.

www.nationwidechildrens.org/family-resources-education/health-wellness-and-safety-resources/helping-hands/eye-tear-duct-massage

My DS had this for months and months when he was born. Lots of pictures of his watery, gunky eye. Then it just went one day. We kept bathing with sterile water.

Definitely a blocked tear duct, not infected and it will probably eventually go away. My dc's didn't and in the end required a procedure to fix it, age 2.5

My youngest had this. He had a dairy allergy and when we cut dairy it went away

Hello! Thought I would just update this post.

Just before he turned six months old, he woke up on Christmas Day and he had no gunky eye!! I could of cried! It's not returned since and it's been a life changer for him and for me!

Just wanted to add this on there in case any other mums are curious about it that in majority of cases it will just go :D

That's great OP and good to know it mostly goes.

However just to add a different experience my DD had it really bad when she was just a few days old- it got to the point where her eye was filling up with gunk like every 15 minutes. We were advised by my postnatal ward (who had a phone advice service for 2 weeks after discharge) to go to A&E, where they ended up prescribing antibiotic ointment to put on it, but they almost admitted her for iv antibiotics and would have done so if the ointment didn't work within a few days. Luckily it did work!

So just in case anyone needs advice I'm sure I'm most cases it does go but it's definitely worth getting checked out properly. I would have hated my little one needing a cannula and iv antibiotics as I'm sure any other parent would when they're so young!