Definition

Glaucoma is not just one disease, but a group of conditions in which abnormal eyeball pressure results in optic nerve damage, which diminishes sight progressively and irreversibly.

Glaucoma is one of the leading causes of blindness. It can damage your vision so gradually you don't notice any loss of vision until the disease is at an advanced stage. In some cases of glaucoma, it usually has no noticeable signs or symptoms except gradual vision loss.

Early diagnosis and treatment can minimize or prevent optic nerve damage and limit glaucoma-related vision loss. It's important to get your eyes examined regularly, and make sure your eye doctor measures your intraocular pressure.

Symptoms

The two most common types of glaucoma, primary open-angle glaucoma and acute angle-closure glaucoma have different symptoms.

Primary open-angle glaucoma presents symptoms like gradual loss of peripheral vision in both eyes while symptoms for acute angle-closure glaucoma include severe eye pain, sudden onset of visual disturbance often in low light, blurred vision and reddening of the eye.

Treatment

Glaucoma treatments reduce intraocular pressure by improving aqueous outflow, reducing the production of aqueous, or both. Glaucoma can't be totally cured, and damage caused by the disease can't be reversed, but treatment and regular checkups can prevent visual loss in people with very early glaucoma. If visual loss has already occurred, treatment can slow or prevent further vision loss.

Regular reviews by the ophthalmologist are essential. Your ophthalmologist will perform measurements of the eyeball pressure, visual field tests and ocular CT scan of the optic nerve head regularly to monitor the progress of the disease.

You may need surgery to treat glaucoma if you can't tolerate medications or if they are no sufficient to control your eyeball pressure. Sometimes a single surgical procedure may not lower eye pressure enough, in which case you'll need to continue using glaucoma drops or have another operation.