Advertisement feature

The secret to keeping your eyes feeling fresh this hay fever season

Optrex can help you manage your allergy symptoms, so you can enjoy the outdoors

4 mins read time  |  Written by Anya Shah

As the days get longer and the weather gets warmer, it’s natural to want to spend as much time outside as possible. Indeed, with spring and summer come endless opportunities to tend to your garden, soak up the sunlight and enjoy your outdoor space as it blooms into beautiful colour once more. But, for those who suffer from hay fever, this time of year can also be a challenging one.

Fortunately, Optrex has a range of eye care products – from ActiMist Double Action spray to an Eye Wash – that can be used in conjunction with antihistamines to soothe irritation caused by allergens such as pollen, making it easy to keep your eyes feeling fresh all season.

How does it work?

Pollen can cause disruption to the lipid layer of the tear film, resulting in itching and watering. By spraying Optrex ActiMist Double Action onto your closed eyes, it helps to repair the lipid layer as you blink, restoring the natural moisture barrier that helps to soothe and refresh irritated eyes.

And, when you use the spray alongside Optrex’s Eye Wash, you can start every day feeling refreshed. Designed with a natural plant extract and purified water that helps to wash out particles, the Optrex Eye Wash helps your eyes to feel revitalised, for comfort throughout the day.

1. Spray

When sprayed onto closed eyelids, the lipids in Optrex ActiMist travel down towards the lid margin.

2. Blink

The natural blink of the eye spreads the lipids across the eye’s surface.

3. Restore

Optrex ActiMist stabilises and restores the lipid layer and is clinically proven to be effective.

What is hay fever?

Seasonal allergic rhinitis, or hay fever, affects around one in five people in the UK*, with the triggers being pollen and grass. It’s essentially an allergic reaction to pollen, which causes symptoms such as itchy and watery eyes, sneezing, coughing and possibly a runny nose.

The main hay fever offenders

Feel like hay fever season is getting worse each year? You aren’t imagining it. Because of rising temperatures and increasing carbon dioxide, pollen season is getting longer, which means your hay fever symptoms last longer too. Here are just a few of the biggest culprits:

Grass pollen
This is one of the main offenders, causing around 95%** of people’s hay fever. Grass pollen levels are at their highest between May and August.

Tree pollen
It’s estimated there are about 100 different types of trees known to trigger a hay fever reaction. As the first pollen to be released, levels are typically highest between mid-March to early May.

Pollution
This can actually worsen your hay fever symptoms by interacting with pollen grains, bursting them open and releasing more of the allergenic proteins that trigger hay fever.

*nhs.uk/conditions/allergic-rhinitis/. **asthma.org.uk/advice/triggers/pollen/. Optrex Actimist for Itchy and Watery Eyes and Optrex Eye Wash are medical devices. Always read the instructions. Date of preparation: April 2021. RB-M-32940