Blocked Tear Duct Diagnosis

A patient's medical history and physical examination of the eye help to diagnose blocked tear duct.

The following tests help confirm the diagnosis of blocked tear duct -

Tear Drainage Test (fluorescein dye disappearance test) - Special eye stain (fluorescein dye) is used to test how the tears are draining. One drop of the dye is placed in each eye. If there is a significant amount of dye in the eye after five minutes of normal blinking, it indicates that the person may have a blocked tear duct.

Irrigation and Probing - The doctor may flush a saline solution through the tear drainage system to check how it drains, or use a probe to check for blockages.
Eye imaging tests (dacryocystography or dacryoscintigraphy) - X-ray, computerized tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) images are taken after a contrast dye is passed from the puncta in the corner of the eye through the tear drainage system. The location and cause of the blockage can be found by these techniques.(4^✔)

References:

What Is a Blocked Tear Duct? - (https://www.aao.org/eye-health/diseases/what-is-blocked-tear-duct)
Eyes - Blocked Tear Duct - (https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/conditionsandtreatments/eyes-blocked-tear-duct)
About Blocked Tear Ducts - (https://www.uofmhealth.org/health-library/hw3084)
Blocked Tear Duct - Overview - (https://www.nchmd.org/education/mayo-health-library/details/CON-20156926)
Tear Duct Infection (Dacryocystitis) - (https://www.health.harvard.edu/a_to_z/tear-duct-infection-dacryocystitis-a-to-z)

Published on Sep 24, 2014
Last Updated on Feb 07, 2020

JasonG1985 Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Getting DCR surgury on the 11th at the Shiley Eye Center in San Diego for my closed tear duct.

ctnana Monday, October 10, 2011

did this work for you? i have draining from both my eyes like i am crying and they think there is a blockage somewhere in the tear ducts , have an appt thursday ....just wanted to know if this helped

billr Tuesday, August 21, 2012

surgery does more bad than good avoid

Ajay_bhopal Saturday, March 6, 2010

My new baby got Blocked Tear Duct(Dacryostenosis), the 6 days old baby has to be treated surgically at Holy Family Hospital, Delhi, India on 4th March 2010 by expert doctors.

kush25 Saturday, February 28, 2009

I think my tear duct on the left side is blocked a little because my nose get swollen really bad but the tears in my eye go down fine does anyone know if that sounds like a blocked tear duct?

guest Thursday, March 18, 2010

You may experiment taking
glasses of water with tolerable quantity of
lemon juice. caution:Too much lemon juice may lead to
diarrhea; watch your tolerance limits.
pl. reply if your experiment yields beneficial resulta eiyher immediately or after a few days'

AnneMcIntyre Saturday, January 10, 2009

Dear Pat, I have now also got a blocked tear duct and have been told by my doctor that what you had is able to be done easily with no pain. Did you have a sinus infection before it happened that caused it? only one eye is affected and yes I have a sinus infection.

Pat Weinmann Monday, December 29, 2008

My eye doctor stretched the opening-inserted what felt like a needle & irrigated the duct w/salt water. It did hurt briefly, but it did open the duct up. Eye drops 3X daily followed...so far so good.