Need some help choosing a language? Please refer to Browsealoud Supported Voices and Languages. You may have been told to not massage the lid – without massage after heating, your chances for success are quite low.You can translate this page by using the headphones button (bottom left) and then select the globe to change the language of the page. They can also cause second or third degree burns. They rarely work for a stubborn chalazion. *NOTE* – Do not use hot tea bags or boiling water washcloths. The lesion needs to be surgically excised (not just drained), injected with a steroid, or both. It is highly unlikely that medical treatment will work for this problem. Repeat this procedure four times a day, four days in a row. One minute after removing the heat compress, the fat turns back to a solid, so more massage won’t make a difference. The material at the tip of the gland, just behind the lashes, rarely melts – it acts like a cork and you need to uncork it! Gently pressing from the base of the chalazion towards the eyelashes for 30-60 seconds will help loosen the cork.This is an adequate time to convert the thick fat into a liquid, just like melted butter. These devices stay warm to hot for 10-12 minutes. Put it in the microwave for 1-2 minutes – IF IT IS COOL ENOUGH TO HOLD IN THE PALM OF YOUR HAND, you can apply it to your eyelids.These work great if both eyes are affected. Or you can make your own! Some of the large ones even have little wooden handles on each end to help wrap them around your neck. These compresses are widely available in a variety of sizes. This protocol is 95% effective, meaning only 1:20 patients will need surgical excision: Traditional treatments for chalazia are 50% effective. A large, swollen, or persistent chalazion or styes might require surgical drainage. Oral antibiotics may also be used if the chalazion or stye is associated with bacterial infection of the surrounding eyelid tissues (cellulitis). Anti-inflammatory eye drops, ointments or an injection into the bump may be needed if traditional non-invasive treatments are ineffective. Warm compresses over the affected area can promote drainage of the blocked gland (see our protocol for warm compresses below). Most chalazia and styes resolve by themselves within several days to a week, but sometimes can take months to completely disappear without proper treatment. A chalazion is an accumulation of material in the eyelid as a result of a blocked oil gland. It is like a small abscess or “boil” on the edge of the eyelid. A stye, medically referred to as a hordeolum, is a bump in the eyelid that occurs when an oil gland becomes infected. It breaks through the skin, scars the outflow track and surgery to excise this is needed to resolve.Ī chalazion is not the same as a stye, although the terms are often used interchangeably. Otherwise the “fat” in the swollen gland turns rapidly into puss.

It is important to get this gland to drain through its natural opening before it gets infected.

After a couple of days it’s walled off into a bump on the eyelid. When one of these glands gets blocked, this “liquid” fat solidifies. This fat normally acts to seal the tear film onto the front of the eye, keeping the tears from evaporating prematurely. These glands constantly produce a tiny amount of thin fatty liquid. Each eyelid contains on average 25 modified sweat glands that run vertically and drain just behind the eyelashes.

Warm eye compress for chalazion