Causes, symptoms, and Treatment of Glaucoma
Glaucoma is usually a condition that causes harm to your eye’s optic nerve and gets worse as time passes. It’s often associated with a buildup of pressure in the eye. Glaucoma tends to become inherited and may not display until later in a lifetime.
Glaucoma is not just one eye disease, but a group of eye conditions resulting in optic nerve damage, which may cause loss of vision. The abnormally high pressure inside your eye (intraocular pressure) usually, but not always, causes this damage.
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The increased pressure, known as intraocular pressure, can harm the optic nerve, which transmits images to the brain. If damage to the optic nerve from substantial eye pressure continues, glaucoma may cause permanent loss of imaginative and prescient vision. Without treatment, glaucoma can cause complete permanent blindness within a couple of years.
Globally, glaucoma is the second-leading source of irreversible blindness. In fact, as many as 6 million consumers are blind in both eyes because of this disease. In the United State alone, according to just one estimate, more than 3 million people have glaucoma.
Possibly half of the those that have glaucoma, however, may not know they’ve already the disease. The reason there’re unaware is that glaucoma, in the beginning, causes no symptoms, as well as the subsequent loss of facet vision (peripheral vision), is normally not recognized.
Types of Glaucoma:
- Open-angle glaucoma. Also called wide-angle glaucoma, this is the most typical type of glaucoma. The structures with the eye appear normal, but fluid inside the eye does not flow properly with the drain of the eyes, called the trabecular meshwork.
- Angle-closure glaucoma. Also called acute or chronic angle-closure as well as narrow-angle glaucoma, this sort of glaucoma is less common but might cause a sudden buildup of pressure inside the eye. Drainage may be poor since the angle between the iris and the cornea (where a drainage channel for that eye is located) is usually too narrow.
Symptoms and Signs of Glaucoma
Primary open-angle glaucoma signs and symptoms include:
- Gradual loss associated with peripheral vision, usually within both eyes
- Tunnel vision from the advanced stages
Acute angle-closure glaucoma signs and symptoms include:
- Eye pain
- Queasiness and vomiting
- The unexpected onset of visual dysfunction, often in low light
- Blurred vision
- Halos close to lights
- Reddening of the eye
Because chronic types of glaucoma can destroy vision before any signs and symptoms are apparent, be alert to these factors:
Treatment of Glaucoma
Elevated central eye pressure (intraocular pressure). If the internal eye pressure (intraocular pressure) is greater than normal, you’re at greater risk of developing glaucoma, though not everyone using elevated intraocular pressure develops the disease.
Ethnic background. African-Americans older than age 40 have better risk of developing glaucoma as compared to the whites (Caucasians). African-Americans also will probably experience permanent blindness because of glaucoma. People of Asian descent come with an increased risk of acquiring acute angle-closure glaucoma. People of Japanese descent may be more prone to have normal-tension glaucoma.
Ancestors and family history of glaucoma. If you’ve got a family history of glaucoma, you’ve got a greater risk of acquiring it. Glaucoma may possess a genetic link, meaning there’s a defect in more than one genes that may cause certain individuals to become more susceptible to the disease.
Medical conditions. Various conditions may increase your own risk of developing glaucoma, as well as diabetes, heart diseases, high blood pressure and hypothyroidism.
Different eye conditions. Severe eye injuries can cause increased eye pressure. Other eye conditions that may cause increased risk connected with glaucoma include eye cancers, retinal detachment, eye swelling and lens dislocation. Certain sorts of eye surgery also might trigger glaucoma.
