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Anyone else have issues with tear ducts not opening?

LittleBugMamaLittleBugMama
in Preemies
Hey all! My daughter is almost 10 months old and her left tear duct has never opened on its own.  I was told to massage her eye with a warm washcloth every day, which we have been doing, and that it should open on its own.  At her 9 month checkup, her pediatrician said that we could go ahead and schedule an appointment to have it opened via a probe. Surprise I decided to wait until she is a year old and see if the duct had opened by then....I'm just not comfortable putting her through the pain of having a procedure done if it might open by itself, especially considering that a little extra eye drainage is a minor inconvenience.  Did anyone else have this issue?
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Re: Anyone else have issues with tear ducts not opening?

  • st.augbridest.augbride member
    Yes, ds has a blocked left tear duct. It's opened a few times but always closes again. We were told that if it's still blocked at a year that we'll need to schedule the procedure to open it. We recently saw a pediatric opthalmologist for a different issue and he said that it's a simple procedure, though he also knows firsthand that no "procedure" feels simple to a parent since even his kid needed this and he got so nervous. He said it's really common though. I also am hoping it opens so we can avoid it, but I'm thinking that we probably will end up needing to do it.
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  • damabo80damabo80 member
    Both tear ducts are blocked on LO. I need to start massaging them.


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  • ShannonSkyShannonSky member
    DD had one blocked duct, which cleared up after several weeks of massaging several times per day. Make sure you're massaging down the side of the nose and the top of the cheek area. I'd also go see an eye doctor, we got a referral for one, but you can also go see a participating eye doctor through the InfantSee.org program. The procedure is simple, but as far as I know, it does involve general anesthesia. 
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  • kck329kck329 member

    imageShannonSky:
    DD had one blocked duct, which cleared up after several weeks of massaging several times per day. Make sure you're massaging down the side of the nose and the top of the cheek area. I'd also go see an eye doctor, we got a referral for one, but you can also go see a participating eye doctor through the InfantSee.org program. The procedure is simple, but as far as I know, it does involve general anesthesia. 

    This was our experience as well.

    I'd talk to an eye doctor about the timeline. We were told that they wouldn't do the procedure until she was a year old. If its any consolation, my OT's daughter had the procedure and she said it was not as stressful as she anticipated. 

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  • flutepharm87flutepharm87 member
    Yup, Jack's right tear duct hadn't opened on it's own. It was like that since birth. I massaged it with a warm washcloth every day and it opened up recently. Keep at it, it worked for us eventually!
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