The contaminants in your tap water can affect your body in a  number of different ways. Not only can poor water quality  affect your health when you drink your home’s tap water, but it can also affect  your body when you shower, wash your hands and perform any other daily task  that involves water. One common complaint that people have with unfiltered tap  water is that it irritates their eyes. Today we’re going to focus on this issue  by talking about how tap water can irritate your eyes and what you can do to  stop it from happening!

Our eyes come into  contact with tap water in various ways

The most obvious time that our eyes come into contact with  tap water is when we are showering.  It’s not just the water itself that makes contact with our eyes in the shower,  but also the water vapor that’s produced when the water is hot.

In addition to when we’re showering, tap water also touches  our eyes when we put contacts in and when we wash our faces at the sink.

Which tap water  contaminants cause eye irritation?

• Hardness  minerals. If your home has hard water, then your  tap water contains high levels of minerals like calcium and magnesium. These  hardness minerals are known  to dry out your eyes, which can make them itchy and red whenever you shower  or wash your face. In addition, because soap does not lather well in hard  water, soap residue can get stuck in your eye and cause irritation.
• Chlorine.  Chlorine is added to  most public water supplies as a disinfectant. Many people report that their  eyes burn and itch when they wash their face or shower in chlorinated tap  water. Chlorine is also present in water vapor, which causes even more irritation  to the eyes in the shower.
• Allergens.  Many people have allergic reactions to certain types of water contaminants.  Often times, those reactions include swelling and irritation of the eyes.

How can you prevent  your tap water from irritating your eyes?

In order to prevent your tap water from irritating your  eyes, you have to remove the contaminants that are causing the problem. For  hardness minerals, that means installing a water softener. If chlorine or allergens  are the problem, then you should consider installing a carbon filter or reverse osmosis system.  Regardless of the type of system that you install, it should be of the  whole-house variety. That’s because a whole-house water  filtration system will filter the water at every tap, including the shower,  which point-of-use  systems are unable to do.

If you have any questions about why tap water irritates your  eyes, or if you’d like a water system serviced or installed in your home,  contact EPA Water, your water softener and  water filtration system dealer in Pennsylvania and New Jersey. We provide  service all over Eastern Pennsylvania and New Jersey, including towns like  Quakertown, Allentown and Newtown, PA.

photo credit: emmavanhecke via photopin (license)