“The Stye Guy” By Dr. Maximilian Padilla
- Posted on: Oct 20 2020
One morning last year I woke up and my left lower eyelid felt a little different. Thinking nothing of it I walked into work and my fellowship director looked at me from across the room and said, “You have a stye”!
Stye is a broad term for a harmless growth on the eyelid. A more concise term is chalazion, or hordeolum. Either way you cut it, these growths are a collection of inflammatory material that builds up behind a blocked oil gland and can be incredibly uncomfortable as I experienced.
While stye’s may be benign there is certainly the discomfort of having a growth on the eyelid, and the effect on your appearance that can be distressing and affect your life.
During my residency and fellowship in Oculofacial Plastic Surgery I developed a three-step treatment plan to effectively treat styes. Starting with the least invasive treatment, I usually prescribe a topical antibiotic/anti inflammatory eye drop, if this doesn’t work a steroid injection into the eyelid is the next step and usually resolves the lesion. In the rare case that the injection doesn’t take care of the bump, after numbing the eyelid, I can do a simple incision and drain out the inflammatory material.
My stye eventually went away and so will yours! Please call our offices for an appointment, and ask for the “Stye Guy”.