Jones stent in eye

[ohmypooreyes]

I hope this is the correct place to post this. It's vey niche, so I'm not sure if anyone will have any suggestions, but thought it worth asking.

Following olfactory cancer, i had proton beam therapy. This can effect other areas than the specific area being treated. In my case, a while after the treatment, I developed blocked tear ducts that mean I get very sore eyes.

I was referred to the eye hospital, who inserted a removable stent to try and open the tear duct, but unfortunately this didn't work and I later had another operation to fit a permanent stent. (They are sometimes called a Jones stent.). This is made of a tough glass.

Mt issue is that the stent keeps getting blocked up. My consultant recommended cleaning it out myself when it gets blocked, using a very tiny interdental brush. (This isn't recommended if I just google cleaning an eye stent, it says this should only be done by the hospital, but I can't expect the hospital to see me three times a week.) I was willing to try this, but the interdental brushes don't seem to go deep enough into the stent to fully clear it.

Has anyone else on here got a Jones stent or similar? If so, do you ever try to clear it out yourself? Do you use anything other than an interdental brush? If so, what have you tried?

Or anyone work in eyecare and have any suggestions of something long, thin and ideally flexible that I could try?

Thank you.

I've no idea what a Jones stent might look like, but might some of the long flexible things for cleaning hearing aids work? Something like this:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Hearing-Cleaning-Multifunctional-Accessories-Cleaner/dp/B0D5CQFP1S/ref=sr_1_7

Thank you @SylvanMoon. Happy to look at any suggestion. I am also happy to buy several different things such as this, to see what is best.

Shamelessly bumping this thread in case anyone else might have another suggestion. I will give the earlier suffestion a try, but wanted to prehaps try a few different things to see what works best.

My suggestions would be to avoid a blockage - make sure you don't have any blepharitis and flush it daily with saline.
Also make sure that you're not using overly viscous dry eye drops.

So sorry to hear of this @ohmypooreyes and I have no experience of this but I’ve been under opthamology for 5 years for other issues.

I’ve been following another thread that you might find useful.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/cancer/5459615-been-referred-to-ocular-oncology-at-moorfields?page=2&reply=152987245

Wishing you and all the other posters the best of luck for the future.

Thank you. I have various eye drops prescribed, including Xailin night eye ointment and Viscotears for use in the day. Are these what you would call viscous eye drops? (I guess so from the name). My eyes are apparently really dry and theses help with that, but if these are what is making the stent get blocked so frequently, then perhaps it is counter productive.

I had to google what blepharitis is. It appears to be swelling of the eyelid and I don't have that. But without the eye drops/ointment, I do wake up with me eyelids stuck together.

I do have saline rinses that I use regularly.

Thank you for the suggestions.

Thank you. I will have a read of that thread.

Wishing you all the best too.

Heat treatments for blepharitis are recommended for dry eyes as well. You might want to try either a microwaveable blepharitis bag or gel eye pad once or twice a day. But be sure to put a warm wet compress on the eyes under the bag or pad. And then, if you can, massage your tear ducts for a few seconds after the heat treatment. I have Sjogren's Syndrome and use Hylo-Tear drops and Hylo-Night ointment. If they're suitable for your condition, you can get them on prescription (and also over-the-counter).

Thank you. I already have a gel eye mask, although I currently keep in in the fridge to use cold, because if I inadvertently rub my eyelids to wipe away excess tears, they get sore and the cold eye mask helps with that, but I could try using it warm twice a day.

I have tried hylo eye drops and hylo-night in the past, but didn't find they helped much with the dry eyes. I could buy some more and try them again and see what they are like now. I'm sure if they help, my consultant would be willing to change my prescription, but I don't think my next appointment with the consultant is until September.

My stent has been totally blocked now for about a week and it's doing my head in! I try not to get too frustrated about it because I know that without the cancer treatment that effected my tear ducts, I wouldn't be here now. But it is frustrating. My eye's get worse if I go outside and there is a bit of wind or sun or anything, so I tend to spend most of my time indoors, which is frustrating, it would be nice in this heat to find a shady spot and sit in the garden to read a book.

I haven't heard of Sjogren's Syndrome, but I just googled it and I'm sorry to hear you are suffering like this with it. There are so many conditions that we don't know about until we have personal experience of them.

Thanks again for trying to help.

I don’t have the tubes yet but I am going to have the surgery soon so have been reading about it a lot.

There was an article which said that in order to keep the tubes clear you need to to a strong inward sniff once daily. So when you put in your eye drops and the drops pool near your tear duct do an inward sniff with your nose. This drains the drops along with any mucus into your nose and the clears the tube. Unfortunately, I can’t find the article now.

You need to tilt your head back while doing it.

Thank you. I think I read that article too. That doesn't seem to work fir me. I'm not sure, but that could be because the inside of my nose is different to most people's due to the surgery I had for the Olfactory cancer.

When my stent is clear, I can pinch my nostrils together and blow and the air comes out through the stent, along with any gunk. But that isn't happening at the moment.

Due to the olfactory surgery, I have to use a sinus rinse a few times a day and when the stent is clear, the saline solution also goes up my nose and out of the stent, which I also think helps it keep clear, but I need the stent to clear before that will happen again. Hence why I made the post about something to clean it out with.

As I said before, if you google it is not recommended to try and clear the stent blockage yourself, so you will probably be told after your surgery not to try this under any circumstances. (So don't do what I do) My consultant had recently gone to a conference where the use of inter dental brushes was recommended, which is when she suggested it to me.

I hope your operation goes well and makes your eyes feel better. If it is any consolation to you, my operation was fine.