Eye Twitching, or Blepharospasm, is involuntary eyelid twitching. It is also referred to as an eye muscle spasm. The term blepharospasm really applies to any abnormal blinking or involuntary eye twitching of the eyelids caused by uncontrolled contractions of the muscles around the eyelids Sometimes people experience the twitching under the eye and others may experience the twitching in their right eye or twitching in their left eye. In simple terms it is a blinking disorder. One type of blepharospasm, Benign Essential Blepharospasm or BEB is a blinking disorder that is not life threatening and has an unknown causes. Other types of blepharospasm may be associated with dry eyes, Tourette’s Syndrome or other neurological problems. Eye Twitching, for most people, is just annoying, involuntary eye muscles spasm surrounding the eye that go away over time. The spasms usually occur a few times and come back. Spasms that cause twitching on one side of the face are known as hemifacial spasms. These are typically due to some form of irritation to the facial nerve This type of spasm requires visiting your family doctor who may refer you to a neurologist or an eye care professional, in order to determine the cause and what treatment might be appropriate Mild Eye Twitching Will usually go away on its own Cut down on stress Rest up Severe Eye Twitching Medication (different depending on situation) usually to relax muscles Botox injections Surgery only for the severest of cases that hamper vision Eye Twitch - Preventive Measures Stress management - keep stress under control Get plenty of sleep to keep eye muscles rested When in vision intensive scenarios such as computer work, take frequent breaks to give the eyes a break common eye twitch causes include: Stress Irritation of the Cornea or Conjunctiva Fatigue Lack of sleep Prolonged staring at a computer screen or television Nervous system disorders

Eyecare : Medication-induced Non-stop Persistent Eyelid-twitching - How I Eventually Get It Totally Cured By Acupuncture & Other Medical Details Note : The following article is only meant as a reference material to the intended recipients and advices should be sought from the medical experts to establish the authenticity of its contents. For your information, I get this non-stop eyelid twitching sickness which is diagnosed as one of the symptoms of Tardive Dyskinesia (neuroleptic medication-induced repetitive, involuntary, purposeless facial muscle movements), while living abroad indirectly from depression (Schizophrenia) through subsequent allergy and overdosage of the related-medications (Risperdal)and I hope that the information given below will be useful to the intended readers. In this regard, Tardive Dyskinesia actually falls under the EPS (extrapyramidal symptoms) syndrome which may well include dystonia, parkinsonism etc. Such EPS syndrome (especially physical movement disorders, including Hemifacial Spasms triggered by bodily chemical imbalances) in turn is caused by disturbances to the dopamine receptors (one of the main neurotransmitters essential for the control of human body motions / key elements of neurons(nerve cells)) in the nervous system which is normally induced by most of the AAP's (atypical antipsychotics) and other related medications that tend to antagonize the dopamine receptors such as blocking them etc (in carrying out their medical mechanisms to cure certain other sicknesses and unfortunately is also one of the unavoidable side effects of such medications). Next such a situation would then lead to potential interruptions to the "message sending, conveying and relaying" neuron operations between the human brain and any parts of the human body that would in turn trigger off a variety of largely uncontrollable involuntary and purposeless movement disorders on any parts of our body that are substantially beyond control of the ones suffering from them. In such a connection, non-stop eyelid twitching, which is lately referred to as Blepharospasm or Myokymia is actually a symptom of involuntary and uncontrollable movements in the muscles around a person's eyes which in turn make them appear like 'blinking non-stop' to other people. Generally, the movements of one's muscle is controlled by the nerves around them that in turn receive signals from the brains which ultimately dictate the variety of 'ways' in which such desired movements are to be conducted based on a person's will. The causes of such non-stop eyelid-twitching symptom in most common cases may just due to short-term stress, over-tiredness, over-straining of one's eyes, occasional anxiety, temporary panic fits and nervousness which in turn can be easily relieved and recover naturally by a good rest, more relaxation and trying to calm oneself down to stop getting anxious, panic and worried and stressful over certain things. In this regard, such phenomena tend to be quite common among certain students and other professionals. However, in the cases of a persistent uncontrollable non-stop twitchings of the eyelids which only get aggravated rather than improved over time and last for months and even years, it may just probably imply that the nerves around the eyes organ are simply not 'properly functionable' enough to bring about the desired movements of the muscles based on the mental instructions from the brains of a person (such as the medical reasoning elaborated above). Except for any brain and other eye muscle damages/eye muscle disorders caused by permanent lack of certain nutrients and minerals etc or other irritations to that organ like dry eyes, sore eyes, bacteria infections etc, such a chronic eyelid-twitching sickness may likely be caused by certain disturbances and disorders that affect or weaken the functionality of the nerves around the eyes to bring about the desired movements of this organ based on the person's will. In this regard, the possible reasons of such chronic non-stop eyelid-twitching sickness may probably due to the causes as mentioned above which is experienced by a person over a considerably long period of time rather than just temporarily. Apart from that, other likely causes maybe be certain traumas, especially the emotional ones, allergy to or overdosage of certain medications that carry such side effects as muscle spasms, particularly photophobia in the case of non-stop eyelid-twitching symptom. In fact, I myself have also been suffering from such a sickness due to allergy and overdosage to such medications like Risperdal and other similar drugs (of which I have stopped taking and replaced with Seroquel so as not to further worsen the non-stop eyelid-twitching problem and to prevent a relapse of that sickness after I get healed). As such, I would very much like to share my own genuine personal experience with you over the course of my treatment of such a sickness and I hope that it will somehow be helpful to a certain extent especially to those who have been having the similar experience as mine and I would to emphasize that it again only is meant as a reference material to anyone reading it. For your information, I have been suffering from this sickness in the past few years whereby my eyelids also tend to twitch both continuously and uncontrollably without me being able to do anything to control the twitchings at all. As a result, my eyes would seem like blinking all the while to anyone who looks at me and I totally could not drive, look directly and persistently at the pc or tv screens and most of the times, I simply can’t read any books or newspaper properly. And I have sought lots of medical treatments and advices as well as apply various kinds of eyedrops, taking various types of vitamins, mineral pills as well as many types of anti-muscle spasm medications from lots of eye specialists, neurosurgeons and psychiatrists (who explain the medical theories mentioned above to me), ENT specialists and other general practitioners, and even have the MRI examinations taken to get my eyes cured , but these efforts turn out to be in vain as they fail to yield any positive results and my eyes still keep on blinking non-stop. Luckily, just about a year after I suffer from such a sickness, I come across an acupuncture expert who studied and observed closely about my problems and then administer a therapy needle on the part of the flesh at the back of the palm which is about 1.5 cm (applicable to the average grown adults only) vertically from the point of intersection (that would appear visibly when the fingers are closed loosely together ) between my thumb and my forefinger of my right hand (as per thumbnail attached below) to strengthen the weakened and sensitive nerves around my eyes. Kindly take note that this point is located at a much 'fleshy' instead of a much 'boney' area - perhaps you would need to briefly explore that part of your right hand at the same time to locate that point, and I hope you will understand that the hand structures of each person differ from one another. After that, he just ask me to administer an alternative self-therapy of acupressure onto the surface of that acupuncture point for at least 2 hours a day and then consistently for about 2 months. Basically, the instrutcions that I receive from the acupuncture expert can be generally summarised in such a way that, when the acupuncture point is determined and identified accordingly, the person can then re-open his right hand, and then what the person can do is to sit down, and at the same time press onto the surface of that acupuncture point (using just mild force) with any long blunt-pointed object such as toothpick, a normal writing pen (which is out of ink of course) etc against one's chin (suggested for convenience purpose) for a continuous 2 hours (during any time in a day), and it's preferably to do that when the person is about to go to sleep at night (so that he can have more free time to do it). However , if you are eager to find out the very exact location of that particular acupuncture point to further verify the information given above, I would suggest you to seek consultancy from a licensed acupuncturist. About the question of how would one know that he / she is applying the blunt-pointed instrument-aided pressure at the right point (the "He Gu" acupuncture point - please refer to the diagram below), well, the nerves of our bodies especially the ones closely adjacent to each other, would tend to interwind, overlap and interconnect among one another. Whilst the 1.5 cm and its location on the wrist as portrayed in the diagram below for the 'He Gu' acupuncture point is actually a standard measure for the size of the hands of the average grown adults. Next, applying blunt-pointed instrument-aided pressings upon it (or any points around that 'He Gu' acupuncture point area) will actually generate direct stimulations to the other nerves surrounding that pressed point around the wrist area as well, and subsequently, produce a reflexology stimulus / 'qi' that will flow / travel right up to the 'final destinations'(please refer to the medical references weblink added below), which are the peripheral nerves attached to the muscles of the entire face, especially the eyelids to generate the desired healing effects to the intended areas by gradually restoring their bodily chemical balances. In my case and the others, that acupuncture technique actually serves to gradually and eventually drive out the risperdal toxins / other related contaminating substances that disrupt the normal functioning of the dopamine neurotransmitters chemicals of the neurons / nerve cells around our eyelid muscles and cause all those rapid unwanted eyelid-twitching / eye-blinking, totally out of our bodies and enable us to get totally cured once and for all in the end. In this regard, based on the acupuncturist, the blunt-pointed objects such as normal writing pen (which is out-of-ink of course) etc instructed to me for such self-administred therapy is actually intended as a substitute for the acupuncture needle to deal effectively with the particular acupuncture point. Unlike the other method of acupressure which involves the use of fingers to press and massage the acupuncture points, the use of blunt-pointed object in such a case for the treatment of chronic eyelid-twtiching is actually meant as a 'leverage' to provide an adequately focused and hence a 'reflexology stimulus' that is strong enough to deal more precisely and effectively with that acupuncture point. Whereas, if that acupuncture point is to be treated with fingers, the stimulus effect generated would be very much smaller due to the facts that such pressings and massagings would reasonably not last long enough to provide any reliefs for the chronic eyelid-twitching. Besides, given the larger suface area of the fingers as well as their rounded physical shape (compared to the blunt-pointed objects), a large part of the forces produced from such pressings and massagings would then be reasonably applied onto the related muscles rather than directly onto the intended nerves through the related acupuncture point to deal effectively with such sickness. Please be reminded that a good sleep at night throughout the therapy period is essential for the healing to be effectively done. And a person shouldn't associate oneself again with the underlying causes such as over-straining of the eyes, excessive cafeine intake, allergy/overdosage of certain medication (with muscle spasms side effects) that causes this non-stop eyelid-twitching to the particular person in the first place to avoid a relapse of that sickness, especially after getting cured from it. Please take note that one should continually apply that method in the case where it proves to be effective in dealing with the eyelid twitching problem (after trying it for about 3 days' time). For your reference, I get my eyelid twitching stopped the next day after the acupuncture treatment. But when I stop the treatment for the next few days, the twitchings just come back again. Based on the acupuncturist, the explanation for the relapse is such that if one were to apply just one-off / short-term treatment, it would then only serve to disperse the dopamine-disturbing toxin / other 'contaminating agents' around one's eye nerves enabling the twitching to stop just temporarily (without totally purging such toxins / 'contaminating agents' out of the human body). So, it works just like doing a physiotherapy whereby one should complete the whole course of treatment (in this case, applying that self-administered technique persistently for weeks / a few months) to get the eyelid-twitching sickness totally cured effectively once and for all in the end. Next, the suggested duration of two-hour period/day (continuous non-stop healing process) for that self-administered treatment is just what I have recommended so far to other persons having the similar symptoms based on my very own healing experience from this eyelid-twitching sickness and the others who suffer from it (who eventually get it totally cured). All in all, it would acutally depend on one's healing progress for the eyelid twitching sickness upon applying that suggested self-administered acupuncture method. In my case, having exercised that self-administered acupuncture method persistently for 2 months based on his order, my non-stop eyelid-twitching that makes my eyes blinking all the while just totally recover in time and I can drive, work with the pc screens, watch tv, movies and read as well as work like any other normal persons. Besides, actually before I decided to seek acupuncture treatment (as recommended by my friends) to deal with this sickness, I did accept the suggestion of a neurosurgeon to take Botox injections to deal with the problematic eyelid-muscles that caused all the non-stop twitchings. Next, the Botox injections, in fact did give positive results in the first place whereby my eyelids just didn't twitch that violently after being given the injections. However, upon knowing from the neurosurgeon that Botox injections was actually not an effective cure for this non-stop eyelid-twitching sickness, for the very reason that the medications would just serve to sort of 'half-paralyse' the eyelid muscles without being able to do anything curative to the problematic nerves around the non-stop twitching eye muscles, coupled with the fact that such Botox medications would tend to get immunized by the human body, it would just mean that larger and larger quantities of such medications would be required for each subsequent injection therapy (which last for 3-6 months each) in order to achieve the similar healing effect of the previous ones. Besides, it was also actually a very expensive therapy as it would cost me about 5,000 dollars for each injection therapy session and hence, to keep on spending such huge sums of money to stop my eyelids from twitching would just be very unreasonable. Whilst the neurosurgeon mentioned to me also about a surgical treatment to effectively cure the non-stop eyelid-twitching, the operation, apart from being very costly, was also actually a very risky one as its failure may very well bring blindness to the persons being operated. At the same time, even such surgery were to turn out to be successful, it would also be unable to achieve 100% complete healing to anyone being operated in the sense that the eyelid-twitching conditions can never 'look perfectly normal' like the ones who were totally not troubled by such a sickness at all. So, I just eventually gave up the idea of getting a surgery to treat the sickness and chose acupuncture treatment instead to deal with my non-stop eyelid-twitching . Frankly speaking, at first I didn't actually have any faith or confidence in such a needle-based therapy and I hardly believed that these needles alone would be able to get my non-stop eyelid-twiching healed. Next, having received such therapy, my eyelids still twitched violently like before without any improvements. However, after taking a good sleep at night that particular day after the acupuncture treatment, I just woke up the next day and found that there were lots of dried mucus that stuck around my eyes, and surprisingly, after rubbing away these dried mucus to open up my eyes, my eyelids just don't twitch so violently anymore and immediately I was able to do the simple readings and watch tv as well as work with the PC screen without getting any discomfort. And based on the acupuncturist who dealt with my sickness, that acupuncture point as mentioned in that main article was actually directly interconnected with the bundle of nerves around the eye muslces, and so by administering treatment to it, that will sort of applying some kind of 'reflexology stimulus' to the nerves around the eye-muscles to improve the blood circulation around that area as well as to strengthen these specific nerves and to enable any unwanted metabolism wastes, blockages and toxins accumulated around that eye areas to be effectively purged out of a person's body (through dried mucus around one's eyes) And having applied that therapy on my own as instructed by the acupuncturist, my eyelid-twitching condition just got better and better day after day and within 2 months, the sickness was totally gone whereby my I just appeared to be perfectly normal to anyone who talked to, looked and stared at me until now. Though the therapy mechanism mentioned above could hardly be scientifially verified and proven by the modern medical science, however, as far as a patient suffering from this sickness is concerned, it is more the very effective cure for such sickness itself rather than all other medical and scientific reasonings that would eventually matter the most to the patients. As such, this is the main reason why I would seek acupuncture treatment as a last resort to deal with my non-stop eyelid-twitching sickness. For your further information, I have also come across quite a couple of people in my real life annoyed by such a non-stop eyelid-twitching problem of different causes and degrees of severity, and accordingly, I just recommend the method as mentioned above to them and within weeks, they just experience significant improvements to their conditions after applying this therapy, and after a few months , they just recover totally from this sickness. . And I hope that by contributing this piece of article to you, it will somehow help you to in at least getting a clue about this sickness. In terms of the acupuncture technique recommended above, since I am not belonging to the medical field or an acupuncturist myself, I thus would not know whether such an acupuncture technique would actually work in the case of genetical eyelid-twitching sickness, and honestly speaking, out of so many people to whom I have personally recommended that acupuncture treatment, I have not yet come across any of such cases before. Nevertheless, I am pretty sure that most of the people with non-stop eyelid-twitching problems actually get this sickness from other post-birth causes rather than genetically, and I believe that once the acupuncture point is clearly identitified, the recommended technique would work effectively to provide reliefs to the ones suffer from post-birth causes-induced non-stop eyelid-twitching sickness. Another thing is that since the ones to whom I have personally recommended such acupuncture treatment for the treatment of non-stop eyelid-twitching sickness are actually all grown adults, the "1.5 cm measure" mentioned in these articles mentioned above would thus definitely not be applicable to the young children whose hand structures are naturally very much smaller. Next, given that the skin textures of small children tend to be very much delicate and tender, and hence more fragile than that of the adults, they thus should definitely be attented to by the licensed acupuncturists to deal with their eyelid-twitching problems in the case where they choose this choice of therapy. Lastly, I sincerely wish that the ones troubled by such an annoying non-stop eyelid-twitching sickness can recover finally from their illness. Thank you. Please refer to the following weblinks for further information about the acupuncture point & other medications mentioned in this article : Details of The Acupuncture Point : http://www.acuxo.com/meridianPictures.asp?point=LI4&meridian=Large%20Intestine Risperdal : http://www.drugs.com/risperdal.html Seroquel : http://www.drugs.com/seroquel.html Botox : http://www.drugs.com/cdi/botox.html Extrapyramidal Symptoms (EPS) : http://www.hubin.org/publicfamilyinfo/treatment/side_effects/side_effects_6_en.html Tardive Dyskinesia (Re: Non-stop Eyelid-twitching /One of The Extrapyramidal Symptoms) : http://www.healthatoz.com/healthatoz/Atoz/common/standard/transform.jsp?requestURI=/healthatoz/Atoz/ency/tardive_dyskinesia.jsp Further Details About Tardive Dyskinesia : http://www.knowledgeofhealth.com/report.asp?story=Tardive+Dyskinesia+Horror+Stories&catagory=Conventional+Medicine,+Drugs,+Brain Please refer to the weblinks below for a follow-up of the information given above : http://www.tcmdiscovery.com/bbs/forum_posts.asp?TID=4393 http://www.drmirkin.com/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=1147

Just to add a note to the great answers already given. I have recently had this problem although it wasn't severe it was REALLY annoying. It would twitch every 5 minutes or so. I found out that usually wearing (or not wearing in my case) corrective lenses in the wrong prescription can cause fatigue and in turn cause this. I started wearing my glasses for a few days and poof!! The twitching completely went away..perhaps you just need to go get an eye exam :)

It's actually called Blepharospasm which is a symptom of involuntary and uncontrollable movements in the muscles around a person's eyes which in turn make them appear like 'blinking non-stop' to other people. In certain cases, this may be caused by myasthenia (muscular weakness) in the eyes organ as a result of stresses, overstraining of the eyes, lacks of sleeps, the serious lacks of certain nutrients / minerals to support the normal functionings / movements of your eyelid muscles etc. Next, in the case whereby no stress, any kinds of infections, overstraining of the eyes etc are involved whilst the eyelids and the entire organs just look superficially normal and ok, and at the same time, the eyelid-twitching / eye-blinking just get 'unexplainedly' from bad to worse from time to time, such medical scenarios could actually be caused by other neuromuscular disorders which are much more complicated. And in terms of such neuromuscular disorders, they may arise as a neurological / Tardive Dyskinesia side effect of certain medications, especially the powerful mind-altering tranquilizers of antipsychotics / neuroleptics, particularly when such medications are over-relied on to the point of sheer abuse. In such a connection, please consider the following excerpts : - "Chlorpromazine (an antispychotic / neuroleptic) side effects Get emergency medical help if you have any of these signs of an allergic reaction: hives; difficulty breathing; swelling of your face, lips, tongue, or throat. Stop taking chlorpromazine and call your doctor at once if you have a serious side effect such as: twitching or uncontrollable movements of your eyes, lips, tongue, face, arms, or legs;" which are quoted from the website : http://www.drugs.com/mtm/chlorpromazine.html and, "Tardive dyskinesia is characterized by repetitive, involuntary, purposeless movements. Features of the disorder may include grimacing, tongue protrusion, lip smacking, puckering and pursing of the lips, and rapid eye blinking. Rapid movements of the extremities may also occur. Impaired movements of the fingers may also appear. For comparison, patients with Parkinson's disease have difficulty moving, while patients with tardive dyskinesia have difficulty not moving." quoted from : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardive_dyskinesia Other Related Information : Details About The Acupuncture Technique (which involves 'He Gu' Acupuncture Point located on one's wrist) : http://www.curezone.com/forums/fm.asp?i=1233341#i Documented Medical Evidence For The Effectiveness of The Suggested Needleless Acupuncture Technique (A free-of-charge one) : http://www.medicalacupuncture.org/aama_marf/journal/vol14_1/poster1.html Further References For The 'He Gu' Acupuncture Point : http://www.acuxo.com/meridianPictures.asp?point=LI4&meridian=Large%20Intestine My Healing Experience From Risperdal-induced Non-stop Eyelid-twitching / Eye-blinking - In Full Details : http://brainmeta.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=18683 The Story Behind The Suggested Self-administered Acupuncture Technique For Abnormally Rapid Eyelid-twitching / Eye-blinking Described Above : http://www.curezone.com/forums/fm.asp?i=1386471#i Details About Botox Medications / Injections - which are actually medical derivatives from Clostridium botulinum bacterium (which causes botulism): http://www.answers.com/topic/botox http://www.curezone.com/forums/fm.asp?i=1260852#i http://www.curezone.com/forums/fm.asp?i=1422626#i Summary : http://silkwise.com/content/viewthread_thread,4243 Additional Information From Q & A sessions about Blepharospasm / Hemifacial Spasms : http://www.steadyhealth.com/Eyecare_Hemifacial_spasm___Risperdal_induced_Non_stop_Eyelid_twitching___My_Healing_Experience_tref714833.html

Lack of B12 will make your eye jump. Take a supplement every day to get rid of the problem and keep it at bay.