How To Clean Persian Cat Eye Discharge

Persians are not low maintenance cats. Besides their hair, the eyes are an important area that needs attention.

Why?

Persians are a brachycephalic breed. They have flat faces with a short nose and big round eyes. Their face structure causes them to have eye tearing and improper tear drainage. Usually, eye drainage is more of an annoyance to the cat (and unsightly) rather than anything harmful.

The amount and frequency of care varies greatly from cat to cat. Depending on the size of their nose, flatness of their face and just the cat itself. Some will need to be cleaned several times a day and others once a week or not at all.

Bacteria causes the discharge to become rust-brown and can stain the face of white or light colored cats. To prevent infections and staining regular eye maintenance is necessary.

Cleaning the Eyes

Use a quilted cotton make-up pad. Do not use any that are too fluffy or cotton-like that soft fibers could get stuck in the eye.

how to clean persian cat eyes

Lightly dampen the pad with the solution of choice and gently wipe the discharge away from the eye to remove it. Never touch or put any solution directly on the eyes. Use a new pad on each eye to avoid cross-contamination.

You can use warm water or a Multi-Purpose Contact Solution. But again, do not put any solution in the cat's eyes. The water or solution is to wet the cotton pad to wipe UNDER not on the eye.

An Eyebrow Comb + Brush works great if you need to comb the hair around the eyes.

brush for cleaning cat's face

Cornelius is a 'doll faced' Persian has a longer nose. His eyes do not water. Therefore I rarely ever clean his eyes. He just has the very occasional 'sleep crusties' in his eye I remove when they appear.

How to Clean Persian Cat Eyes

Elizabeth's face is flatter than Cornelius's. It isn't an extremely flat face but her eyes do water. So she is somewhere in between a doll-face and peeked face. I try to clean them once a day.

cleaning persian cat eyes

My cats do not have white hair so I don't have to worry about staining. Although I think Elizabeth's hair would stain if I wasn't regularly cleaning the discharge.

For those of you with white cats and watery eyes. What do you use to prevent staining?

I have been recommended Eye Envy Cat Tear Stain Remover as the best product to remove tear stains from white cats and dogs. Do any of you use this? Or do you have a different favorite?

Please share in the comments how you keep your white cats and dogs faces clean.