Researchers Found That Up To 40% Of People With Eczema Go On To Develop Dry Eyes
A growing body of published research suggests eczema and dry eyes are not two separate conditions. They may be two symptoms of the same underlying problem, a deficiency in specific fatty acids that both the skin barrier and the tear film depend on.
If you have eczema, you have probably spent years managing your skin. Creams, ointments, dietary changes, maybe prescription treatments. What you may not know is that research now points to a connection between eczema and dry eye disease that most doctors are not discussing with their patients.
The connection is not a coincidence. It is a shared mechanism. And understanding it may change how you think about both conditions, whether you have one or both of them.
This is the part most dermatologists and eye doctors are not connecting. Your skin barrier and the surface of your eye both depend on the same two specific fatty acids to stay sealed, hydrated, and calm. The skin uses them to build the oil layer that locks moisture in. The eye uses them to build the lipid film that stops tears evaporating too quickly.
When your body does not produce enough of these fatty acids, both barriers start to fail. The skin loses moisture and itches. The eyes dry out and become irritated. It is not two separate problems happening at the same time by coincidence. It is one deficiency showing up in two places.
This is also why the two conditions often do not appear at the same time. Eczema typically shows up first, sometimes years or even decades earlier. The eye symptoms creep in later, usually in the late 30s, once the cumulative deficiency has worn the tear film thin enough that it can no longer compensate. If you have eczema now and your eyes are fine, this does not mean the deficiency is not there. It may mean the tear film has not yet reached its tipping point.
If you have eczema and dry eyes, this shared deficiency is the most evidence-supported explanation research has found. If you have eczema but not dry eyes, this is still worth understanding because the same deficiency driving your skin symptoms may affect your eyes in the future.
You may already be aware that Dupixent, one of the most effective medications for moderate to severe eczema, causes dry eyes and eye inflammation in roughly 25 to 30 percent of the people who take it. That is not a rare side effect. It is one of the most commonly reported.
Think about what that tells you. A drug designed to treat eczema causes eye problems in a quarter of users. That is not a coincidence. It is clinical evidence that the skin and the eyes are connected at a deeper level than most doctors are discussing. Dupixent suppresses immune pathways that help the skin, but those same pathways also maintain the surface of the eye. Fix the skin, disrupt the eyes. The connection is real and documented.
If you are on Dupixent and your eyes have worsened since starting it, this is worth paying attention to. The fatty acid mechanism explained below may explain why, and more importantly, what can be done about it alongside your existing treatment.
GLA and SDA are fatty acids your body is supposed to produce automatically from the fats in your food. GLA builds the oil seal in your skin barrier and on the surface of your eye. It also converts to something called Prostaglandin E1, which calms the nerve endings that drive the itch signal. SDA calms the inflammatory response when the barrier is challenged.
In most people, a specific enzyme handles this conversion and everything works fine. In many people with eczema, that enzyme does not work efficiently. The result is a barrier that cannot hold moisture, a tear film that evaporates too quickly, and an itch signal that stays elevated.
And here is the part that makes this worse. When the barrier has gaps because GLA production is low, it is not just moisture that escapes. Bacteria, irritants, and allergens get in through those same gaps. Once they penetrate the barrier, they trigger a secondary inflammatory and itch response on top of the one already being driven by the GLA deficiency. This is why steroid creams and antibacterial treatments help temporarily. They fight the bacteria and calm the surface inflammation that enters through the gaps. But the gaps remain. New bacteria get in. The cycle repeats.
The creams are not wrong. They are addressing a real problem. But they are addressing the secondary problem, not the primary one. The primary problem is that the barrier has gaps because it does not have the fatty acids it needs to seal itself. Fix the seal and far less gets in. The secondary itch and inflammation reduce because the entry point has been closed.
Genetic variants in the FADS gene cluster significantly reduce GLA production from dietary fats. Some people are born producing less of the fatty acid their skin and eyes depend on, no matter how well they eat.
Schaeffer et al. J Lipid Res. 2010;51(7):1871-1880.Supplementation with pre-formed GLA and SDA significantly reduced the prevalence of atopic dermatitis compared to placebo in a double-blind trial.
Linnamaa et al. Clin Exp Allergy. 2010;40(8):1247-1256.GLA supplementation significantly reduced ocular surface inflammation and improved dry eye symptoms versus placebo. The mechanism: restoration of the lipid layer stability in the tear film.
Barabino et al. Cornea. 2003;22(2):97-101. University of Genoa.The same fatty acids. Two separate conditions. Two separate clinical trials. Both showing meaningful improvement.
"Once you understand that the skin barrier and the tear film are both built from the same fatty acids, the connection between eczema and dry eyes stops being a coincidence and starts being a mechanism. And a mechanism can be addressed."
Now that you understand the mechanism, the answer becomes obvious. Whatever you take would need to do five things at once:
The problem is finding something that does all five. Evening primrose has GLA but no SDA. Fish oil has neither. Most omega supplements address the wrong pathway entirely. And almost none of them include the vitamins and antioxidants needed to repair the damage that years of barrier deficiency have already caused.
We looked for a formulation that met every point on that list. One capsule that delivered pre-formed GLA and SDA together, from a single natural plant source, alongside the co-factors for barrier repair, itch reduction, and overnight recovery.
If the only problem were a missing seal, GLA and SDA alone would be enough. But after years of a deficient barrier, the damage goes deeper. Scratch wounds have accumulated. Collagen has been degraded by chronic inflammation. The ceramide structure of the barrier has worn thin. The overnight repair cycle has been running on depleted resources.
GLA and SDA address the root cause. The other six ingredients in Calm Skin Capsule repair the damage those years of deficiency left behind.
GLA and SDA stop the leak. The other six ingredients repair the water damage.
We asked people who had been taking Calm Skin Capsule for at least 60 days what changed in their daily lives.
This is not overnight relief. If you are itching right now, keep using your cream. If your eyes are dry right now, keep using your drops. Those work on the surface and they work fast.
What Calm Skin Capsule addresses is the reason you keep needing them. Most people notice the itch settling at night first, typically within two weeks. Eyes usually improve by weeks 4 to 6. The full barrier rebuild takes 8 to 12 weeks.
