Home / Treatments
Treatments · U Dry Eye Institute
Dry Eye Treatments
There is no single treatment for dry eye, and no ladder everyone is meant to climb. What there is, is a set of targeted options — each of which addresses a specific mechanism, and each of which is worth doing only if that mechanism is the one causing your symptoms.
Our approach
Sequenced, not stacked
Every treatment on this page addresses a different mechanism. Intense pulsed light targets inflammation. Thermal pulsation clears obstructed glands. iLUX warms and expresses blocked glands one by one under direct visualisation. Hemoderivatives supply what the ocular surface needs to heal. Plugs conserve the tears you already make. None of them is a general-purpose dry eye treatment, and none of them is an upgrade on the one before it.
So we start with what the diagnostics point to, give it long enough to work, and reassess against the same measurements we took at the beginning. If the finding does not support a treatment, we will say so — including when the honest answer is that consistent home care is doing the job and nothing further is needed.
What we will not do
We will not recommend a treatment because it is the most advanced thing we own, and we will not present a more expensive option as a better one. More intensive is not the same as more suitable. Where two paths are reasonable, you should expect to hear both, along with what each involves and what it will not achieve.
Foundation care
The part that does the daily work
Home care is not the consolation prize you get before the real treatment. It is the foundation everything else is built on, and for a meaningful number of people, done properly and done consistently, it is enough on its own. Where in-office treatment is needed, home care is what holds the result between appointments — skip it, and the benefit fades faster.
Warm compresses
Sustained, correctly warm heat applied daily softens the oil in the meibomian glands so a blink can move it. Technique and duration matter more than the device — most people are doing this for too short a time to have any effect.
Lid hygiene
Daily cleaning of the lid margin keeps bacterial biofilm and debris from re-accumulating. It is the single most effective way to extend the interval between in-office lid treatments.
Preservative-free lubricants
Drops manage symptoms; they do not treat the cause. Used frequently, preservative-free formulations avoid the surface irritation that preserved drops can add over time.
Environment and diet
Indoor humidity, screen habits, medications you may already be taking, and omega-3 intake all shift the picture. These are reviewed as part of an assessment, because several of them are more modifiable than people expect.
Products matched to your plan are available through U Shoppe, the U Vision Group retail arm, so what you use at home is the same as what was recommended in the room.
In-office treatments
What we can do here
Each page below explains how the treatment works, who it suits, what the appointment involves and — importantly — who it is not for. Read the ones that match your diagnosis rather than all of them; they are not alternatives to one another.
UltraView DEL™ (IPL)
Our intense pulsed light programme, aimed at the inflammation and abnormal vessels around the lid margin that keep the glands from working. Delivered as a course rather than a single visit, with maintenance considered afterwards.
About UltraView DEL Gland clearanceLipiFlow Thermal Pulsation
Controlled heat applied from the inner lid surface with gentle pulsed pressure, to clear glands that are obstructed but still viable. Suitability depends on what the gland imaging shows, which is why it is assessed first.
About LipiFlowiLUX Thermal Expression
A handheld device that gently warms the eyelid under direct visualisation, then expresses softened oil from blocked Meibomian glands — targeted, gland-by-gland treatment for obstructive MGD.
ZoHx Lid Margin Cleaning
Mechanical cleaning of the lid margin to remove biofilm, crusting and debris. Often done ahead of other lid treatments, because clearing the margin first makes the rest of the work more effective.
About ZoHx Severe or refractoryHemoderivatives (AS & ePRP)
Biologic drops prepared from your own blood, for ocular surfaces that need more than lubrication to heal. Prepared in-house, which removes the usual difficulty of finding a pharmacy that will make them.
About hemoderivatives Tear conservationPunctal Plugs
Small inserts that slow tear drainage so the tears you do produce stay on the eye longer. Most relevant where tear volume is genuinely low, and not appropriate where inflammation is uncontrolled.
About punctal plugsPrescription therapy — anti-inflammatory drops and, where indicated, other medical treatment — is often part of the plan alongside these, and is discussed at assessment.
What to expect
What treatment can — and cannot — do
We would rather be straight with you about this at the start than have you judge treatment against an expectation nobody set properly.
Control, not cure
For most people dry eye disease is a chronic condition. The realistic goal is stable, well-controlled eyes with symptoms that no longer dictate your day — not a one-off fix after which you never think about it again.
Weeks, not days
Ocular surface tissue heals slowly and gland function recovers slowly. Most treatments here are assessed several weeks out, and courses of treatment are spaced deliberately rather than compressed.
Not everyone is a candidate
Some treatments depend on gland tissue that is still viable; others are unsuitable where inflammation is uncontrolled, or where skin type, medication or other health factors make them inadvisable. Suitability is assessed individually, and sometimes the answer is no.
Maintenance is normal
Benefit from lid and gland treatments is durable but not permanent, and repeat treatment at intervals is a normal part of long-term management rather than a sign that the first course failed.
On coverage
Advanced dry eye diagnostics and the in-office treatments on this page are not covered by OHIP, and some extended health plans contribute while others do not. We will set out what a proposed plan involves before you commit to it, so the decision is yours to make with the full picture.
How the plan is decided
From findings to a plan
Assessment
A full workup — gland imaging, tear osmolarity, tear volume and film stability, ocular surface staining, and inflammatory markers — alongside a review of your symptoms, medications and daily environment. The dry eye assessment page sets out what the appointment involves.
Classification
The findings place your dry eye on the spectrum between reduced tear production and excessive evaporation, and grade its severity. Most people sit somewhere in the middle, with one mechanism clearly leading.
The proposed plan
Foundation care for everyone, plus whichever targeted treatments the findings actually support — explained with what each is for, what it involves, and what it will not fix. You decide what proceeds.
Reassessment against the same measurements
We repeat the objective tests rather than relying on recall. That is what tells us whether the plan is working, needs longer, or needs to change — and it is why the baseline numbers are worth taking properly the first time.
Connected care
Treatment that connects to the rest of your care
U Dry Eye Institute (UDEI) is part of U Vision Group, which means treatment here does not sit in a silo. Where the ocular surface is one part of a larger picture, the rest is arranged internally on the same records.
Uptown Eye Specialists
For anything requiring a procedure we do not perform here, including oculoplastic work on the lids, and for findings that extend beyond the ocular surface.
U Eye Laser Cosmetic (UELC)
Where laser vision correction is being considered, the surface is stabilised here first — and the corneal data collected during a dry eye workup sometimes identifies candidates who did not know they were one.
U Optical
For specialty and scleral lens fitting where the corneal surface makes conventional lenses impractical, and for continuing optometric care alongside treatment.
U Shoppe
Home care products matched to your treatment plan, so what you maintain at home is consistent with what was done in the room.
For referring optometrists and physicians
Our role is the advanced and refractory end of ocular surface disease, alongside your ongoing care rather than instead of it. Patients are assessed, treated, and returned with the findings and the maintenance plan. The pathway is on the referring doctors page.
Take the next step
Start with the diagnosis
Choosing a treatment before knowing which mechanism is driving your symptoms is how people end up disappointed by good technology. An assessment comes first, and what follows from it is a conversation rather than a recommendation you are expected to accept.