Allergan, Red Hot Mamas launch dry eye campaign

Irvine, CA, and Roswell, GA—Allergan Inc. has launched a new national dry eye campaign with the Red Hot Mamas, a menopause education provider.

The Dry Eye Book Club (www.dryeyebookclub.com) features author Jacquelyn Mitchard, who has experienced the condition herself. The campaign aims to encourage women to see their eye-care specialists and to visit the Web site for information about dry eye, its symptoms, and treatment options.

In an attempt to make the campaign fun and to strengthen the connection between dry eye, tear health, and reading, Mitchard, author of The Deep End of the Ocean, invited women across the country to vote for their favorite “tear-jerker” books. The results, announced Sept. 30, are guiding the club’s reading for the rest of the year. The author also plans to post comments about some of her favorite books of the genre and about her latest novel, a sequel to The Deep End of the Ocean, on the Web site.

The campaign is in response to research that has demonstrated that women are disproportionately affected by dry eye because of hormonal changes caused by aging and menopause, as well as research that has shown the effects that dry eye can have on everyday activities such as reading. In a 2007 Associated Press-Ipsos poll, among people who reported reading in the previous year, the median number of books read by women was nine, whereas the median number of books read by men was five.