Healthy eye tissue looks white, and yellowing of the sclera could mean an underlying health condition. Yellow eyes occur when your body has too much of a chemical called ‘bilirubin’, a yellow pigment that forms with the breakdown of red blood cells. Usually, the liver filters out bilirubin from the blood and uses it to make a fluid called bile. Bile moves through thin tubes to get to your digestive tract and outside the body as waste.
But if the blood has too much bilirubin, the body won’t get rid of it fast enough and it builds up — turning your skin and eyes yellow. Normally, it’s due to a simple benign cause signifying a problem elsewhere in the body but sometimes yellowish eyes could mean something more serious.
