A few years ago, Susan Tomkin's eyes started to drive her crazy.

"My eyes were dry and itchy and red, a little red, and I just noticed that it wasn't so comfortable anymore," said Tomkin.

Tomkin's ophthalmologist diagnosed her with dry eye syndrome. It's more common as we age.

But, "with contact lens wear, with laser vision correction, certainly the younger age population is not immune from dry eye symptoms," said Dr. Christopher Coad.

Eye drops can ease symptoms but can't fix the problem. Now, intense pulsed light therapy is making an impact.

"And it really came about from people, mainly in the dermatology field using IPL for rosacea and other skin conditions, reporting that their dry eye has improved," said Coad.

The light is directed under the lower lid, targeting glands involved in tear film production, not at the eye itself.

"So the IPL is not only warming up the glands, kind of an intense warm compress for a short period of time to help those glands work a little bit better, but it's also coagulating or sealing some of those blood vessels carrying the inflammatory modulators that are causing some of the dry eye symptoms," the doctor said.

Most patients need four to six treatments. This is Tompkin's second, and she already likes what she sees.

"I'm using drops far less than I was, maybe two or three times a day instead of every couple of hours," she said.

It’s a therapy that's moving her dry eye in the right direction. Coad says 99 percent of his dry eye patients experience improvement in their symptoms after the series of treatments.

This is not covered by most insurance, and costs between $200 and $400 per treatment.