A Doctor On TikTok Says Using This Popular Beauty Product Resulted In 2 Painful Surgeries

Instagram and TikTok have revolutionized the beauty space, with millions of influencers constantly sharing their latest and greatest finds. This is particularly concerning because the product in question is often cited as a "must-have" among all the beauty girlies.

"Like almost everybody else on this planet, I love a beautiful full lash. I love lashes, thick lashes. I think most women can agree that we've probably always been on the hunt for the perfect mascara," began Dr. Mahmood in her TikTok. "It's the topic of conversation in magazines, in Facebook groups, online, influencers, all of it. So about four years ago, I tried Rodan and Fields Lash Boost Serum, and for the first two months, my lashes were insane. Amazing. I mean, people would stop me on the street and tell me how incredible my eyelashes were. It was truly phenomenal."

"And then shortly after, I was at an event, and someone was taking photos of me," Dr. Mahmood continued. "And when I saw the photos afterward, I was like, 'What the hell happened to my eyes?' What was I doing that day? Did I have a stroke? Like, what happened? And I looked in the mirror and I was like, 'Holy sh*t.' I had never noticed that for the past several weeks, one of my eyes was enormous and bulging out, and you could see the white all the way around it. And the other eye looked smaller."

"So immediately went to my eye doctor, who was like, 'Yep, something's wrong. I'm not sure what. I think I know, but I'm going to refer you to an oculoplastic surgeon.' These are surgeons who deal with aesthetics for plastic surgery of the eyelids. So I went to this surgeon in New Jersey. Keep in mind at that time, this was actually several years ago now, but I was in my mid-thirties, a single plastic surgeon. My job is aesthetics. I can't really look crazy," Mahmood explained. "And I went to him, and he was like, 'Okay, this is the first sign of what I think is hyperthyroidism, which means your thyroid's out of whack. And one of the first signs can be, you see it in your eye, one eye starts bulging. So I had a complete testing of that. That was negative. So then he was like, 'Okay, I don't, I don't think it is that now. You may have a brain tumor. You should get an MRI."

"I had two MRIs," Mahmood went on. "I was freaking out, but it turned out they were negative. Throughout this time, I started just cold calling surgeons around the country who were experts in thyroid eye disease, because the whole time I thought that's what I had. I found the surgeon in Pennsylvania, in sort of a rural area, who's triple-boarded. He's facial plastics, ophthalmology, and oculoplastics, one of the most brilliant men I have ever met, and truly just a phenomenal surgeon in person. So I started talking to him...I would send him my MRI, my labs, all this stuff. And then at one point, he was like, 'Wait, have you done anything to your eyes?' And I was like, 'No, I mean, I use this lash serum.' He was like, 'Yeah, that's exactly what it is.'"

Dr. Mahmood then revealed exactly what happened. "Most lash serums have something called prostaglandin," she explained. "These are incredibly harmful chemicals for your eyes. In my case, they caused muscle thinning of the muscle that holds my eyelid up. So what happened in one of my eyes was that the muscle was so thin that my eyelid was drooping and to compensate the other eyelid got bigger. I had to have two surgeries to basically pull that muscle back to help it become strong again, which is wild."

She went on to highlight the additional dangers of prostaglandins.

"The biggest thing is they can cause periorbital fat atrophy, which is basically saying that the fat around your eye and your eyeball and your eye socket becomes thinner and causes your eyeballs to look like they are sinking back, which rapidly accelerates aging," she explained. "So, if you look at someone who's elderly, it looks like their eyes are sunken in. And that's what these lash serums with prostaglandin analogs do. They can also discolor your eyelids. They can cause red eyes. They can cause dry eyes. They can cause cysts. They can cause issues with your iris, which is a colored part of your eye, including changing your iris color."

"Needless to say, it's pretty clear prostaglandins are bad, especially when it comes to eyelash serums," she concluded. "The problem is almost every eyelash growth serum people talk about and know about has prostaglandins in it. So some of the very common ones, Rodan and Fields Lash Boost, Grande Lash, Revitalash, Babe Lash...all of them have this prostaglandin analog."

A Safe Alternative

Dr. Mahmood also offered a safe and effective alternative to popular lash serums.

"Interestingly, one of the ingredients that's just a natural ingredient that has been shown to help grow lashes and doesn't have any sort of side effects like this is castor oil," she added. Like lash serums, castor oil is also a popular staple among beauty enthusiasts, and there are many reasons why, including its hair growth benefits.

"I'm not saying run out to Whole Foods and buy castor oil and put it all over your eyelashes," added Dr. Mahmood. "I'm just saying, if you're going to use eyelash serum, please, please, please be very careful because I just want to help patients not have the same experience that I had, which truly was miserable."

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