When your dog comes home with bloodshot eyes it’s not going to be because they’ve hit the bong at their friend’s house. That may be the explanation for your teenager’s eyes, but not your dog’s. When a dog’s eyes are not well it is more likely to be that they have allergic conjunctivitis caused by the eye redness. There can be any number of different allergens they might be allergic to, but whatever one it is right now it’s causing them to have itchy, red, and watering eyes. So, the question then becomes how to treat dog eye allergies.  

It's just as much a pressing need as it’s going to be for you, and that’s because a dog is going to find the eye itching and watering to be just as unbearable. And no one is going to want to see their dog suffer unnecessarily. The good news is that how to treat eye allergies in dogs doesn’t need to be complicated, and we can start by looking at how 2-legged beings deal with their allergies. We take antihistamines, but are there antihistamines for dogs? Most dogs will do well with an OTC antihistamine like Benadryl for dog allergies.  

That’s good because if it’s possible to deal with the problem without getting a prescription filled that’s going to be preferable for pet owners. But as we’ve all heard, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and it is best if dog owners can identify the allergen and then prevent their pet from coming into contact with it and that’s equally as valuable as how to treat dog eye allergies. The common environmental allergens that may cause inflammation in a dog’s eyes are pollen, food, dust mites, and smoke.  

Halt Histamines 

We’ve made the answer clear for do dogs get eye allergies, and your pet has the same mast cells in their eyes that you do. It’s these cells that produce the histamines that cause eye allergy symptoms in dogs. If the allergic response is occurring most prominently in the eyes, then the most standard approach to treatment is to use an antihistamine eye drop for dogs. This can be seen as all part of pet care, but often times using that OTC antihistamine will be all that’s needed for dog allergy relief and how to treat dog eye allergies.  

 You can also consider using a saline eyewash if the allergic reaction is being caused by an allergen actually getting into the eye. Fortunately, this isn’t something that will be connected to how to treat dog eye allergies very often, but if it is something that happens more often than you can keep an emergency eyewash pump around and they can be used for dogs the same way they are for humans. You don’t need to be cautious about that, but if you are going to use antihistamine eye drops for a dog you should check with a veterinarian first just to make sure it’s safe.