Eyes wide open

Consultant ophthalmologist Maria Agius, from the Saint James Eye Clinic, talks to Adriana Bishop about a scarless, pain-free solution to droopy eyelids and under-eye bags.

I am not a morning person. I put on my best wide-awake face as consultant ophthalmologist Maria Agius appears on my screen to talk about droopy eyelids and under-eye bags.

While I know my puffy eyes will ease, there are others who might always look “sleepy”, which is what Agius is here to address.

Ptosis is the medical term for droopy upper eyelids which can be caused when the nerves that control eyelid muscles are damaged perhaps following an injury, trauma or simply through the stretching of the muscle over time. 

The condition is most prevalent in older people because, with age, the skin and muscles around our eyes get weaker. In younger patients, the regular daily stretching of the eyelids as contact lenses are inserted can cause ptosis.

“In ptosis we are looking at the patient’s actual lid position,” explains Agius. “We check the central reflex from the pupil and the level that the upper eyelid sits from that pupil reflex which gives us the margin reflex distance, in other words the lid height. Normal lid...