Product: Does Tylenol (also called acetaminophen or paracetamol) lower eye pressure
2
Entering edit mode
2.7 years ago
bcdefg1 • 130
@bcdefg1

There are many web pages about Tylenol (also called acetaminophen or paracetamol) lowering the pressure in the healthy and glaucomatous eye.

Intraocular pressure-lowering effect of oral paracetamol and its in vitro corneal penetration properties Clinical Ophthalmology, 02/04/2013 Clinical Article Authors: Mohamed N, Meyer D Published Date January 2013 Volume 2013:7 Pages 219 - 227 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.2147/OPTH.S38473

Some researchers use it orally, other intravenous, and other intraperitoneally.

This clinical trial below was conducted by Johns Hopkins but it has no posted results. https://www.mdlinx.com/hospital-administration/clinical-trials/clinical-trial-detail.cfm?nct_id=NCT02366065 Does Oral Acetaminophen Lower Intraocular Pressure?

This is an old patent application for it https://patents.google.com/patent/ES2424872T3/en

Has anybody tried it or found somehow whether this medicine lowers the IOP? If anyone knows, could you please share what you know here? I have not experienced with it.

iop:intraocular-pressure tylenol:acetaminophen:paracetamol • 2.7k views
ADD COMMENTlink
2
Entering edit mode
2.7 years ago
david 4.2k
@david_fe

From the FitEyes Email Discussion Group:

I have tested paracetamol and seen some small IOP lowering effect at around 1000mg. However, daily long-term use would require that I undergo routine liver function tests. As I don't wish to go through the trouble and expense of that testing, I have decided that the small reduction in IOP I observed was not worth it.

ADD COMMENTlink
0
Entering edit mode

Thanks for the info, David. Would you mind posting more details of your experiment? Did you take 1000mg at one time? How many points did your IOP drop? How long did the reduction in IOP last? Liver health is a valid concern but I wonder if dandelion and milk thistle could help prevent damage. Most pharmaceutical glaucoma treatments are harmful to the body in one way or another so I haven't taken Tylenol off my list of "maybe someday, if necessary" remedies. Thanks for all your help!

ADD REPLYlink
1
Entering edit mode

Regular use of Tylenol (also called acetaminophen or paracetamol) is also associated with hearing loss, the hypothesis being that the medication decreases levels of cochlear glutathione (which has been shown to protect the cochlea from noise-induced damage). A couple of studies:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5209586/
Duration of Analgesic Use and Risk of Hearing Loss in Women https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2831770/
Analgesic Use and the Risk of Hearing Loss in Men

ADD REPLYlink
0
Entering edit mode

It was not my experiment. This was done by a FitEyes member with a Reichert tonometer. He has done a lot of IOP measuring and experimenting for many years. I know him. He's good at this type of experiment.

His initial report said:

I will just provide this little anecdote to the conversation in case anyone with tonometers wish to do similar testing; In two consecutive mornings, I have taking 1000mg of paracetamol on early awakening. On one morning I woke up at 3:30, took the dose, went back to bed and got up at 6:30. This morning I awoke at 5:30, took the dose and then finally awoke at 7:30.
Both times, my eye pressures were 3-4 pts lower than they usually are on first awakening. I will test this further, but others may wish to test for themselves, as I did find this interesting (no other variables noted that were unusual). After doing tonometry for around 4 years, I know my pressures better than the back of my hand!

But that was his preliminary report from just 2 days. Later on, his replies were more along the lines of what he said above and what he said other times such as below:

Opiods generally lower IOP. Tylenol may lower IOP but my own experience is that it is very slight.

Therefore, my understanding was the the initial positive response from the first two days did not hold up on further testing. If he had consistently gotten a 3-4 mmHg reduction each morning he would have been thrilled and would have said the effect was significant. Instead, he called it "very slight."

ADD REPLYlink
0
Entering edit mode

I will also say that I am probably not willing to do the experiment. I do not want to take 1000mg+ of Tylenol each day. The risk of hepatotoxicity becomes higher when using it long term.

Also, I think I know the reason for his good results the first two days. Notice the methodology:

On one morning I woke up at 3:30, took the dose, went back to bed and got up at 6:30. This morning I awoke at 5:30, took the dose and then finally awoke at 7:30.

The "control" experiment for that would be to wake up, get out of bed for a couple minutes, walk to kitchen or whatever, then go back to sleep for a couple more hours.

Invariably, if you do that, you will find a lower IOP upon final awakening compared to if you had slept through the entire night without getting up. Many, many FitEyes members have reported this effect to me. I've seen it a few times myself too.

I think that's what happened in his first two tests, and it is also why he lost enthusiasm in the results after he tested further.

ADD REPLYlink

Login before adding your answer.

Traffic: 22 users visited in the last hour

Use of this site constitutes acceptance of our User Agreement and Privacy Policy.