Glaucoma
Glaucoma is a condition that affects the eyes by causing damage to the optic nerve within the eye and it can worsen over time. It’s generally associated with an increase in pressure inside of the eye. More often than not it’s inherited and may not reveal itself until much later in life. The increase in pressure is known as intraocular pressure and can damage the optic nerve that’s responsible for transmitting images to your brain. Sadly, if you fail to recognise that you’re suffering from glaucoma and neglect to have it treated, then the damage to the optic nerve from high pressure can become permanent resulting in permanent vision loss. Without treatment, glaucoma can and will result in total and irreversible blindness within a
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This can lead to a build up of pressure in the eye, quite suddenly too.
Who is susceptible to glaucoma and what are the causes?
As mentioned previously, glaucoma will usually occur due to the pressure rising within the eye. This can happen due to the fluid within the eye not circulating properly in the front of the eye. This fluid, known as the aqueous humor, will flow out from the eye through a mesh like channel. If the mesh like channel becomes blocked however, the fluid will build up and this will lead to glaucoma. The direct cause of this particular blockage isn’t yet known, although some doctors do believe that inheritance plays a big role. Other less common causes of this condition include blunt or chemical injuries to the eye along with inflammatory conditions. Glaucoma will usually occur in both eyes however it’s not unheard of to involve just one eye or even both but to differing extents. There are also a few factors that could put you at a heightened risk, making you more susceptible and these include:
• Elevated internal eye pressures – if the intraocular pressure is higher than normal then you’ll find yourself at an increased risk of developing glaucoma.
• Age – once you zoom past the age of 60, you’ll find yourself at a much higher risk. This is particularly the case if you’re of Mexican-American heritage. Over the age of 40 and you’ll also find
Although the causes of each type of the Macular Degeneration are different, the risk factors are essentially the same. The wet form of the disease is caused by small blood vessels that grow beneath the retina. The blood vessels leak blood and
As it was stated before cataracts can lead to Glaucoma. Aqueous humor that would normally drain out the eye, through the junction of the cornea and sclera into the blood stream, is being blocked by the free-floating cataract, yet the production of the aqueous humor is still maintained (Smith). Glaucoma is the increased eye pressure that develops from this continuous buildup of aqueous humor within the eye. Untreated, this can cause permanent blindness, and enlargement of the eye. Glaucoma is also common is dog and cats, yet even with advanced medical and surgical treatments, many of them will lose their eye
Glaucoma is caused when fluid is overproduced and it can't flow out at its normal rate which causes pressure to build up.
According to Vaughan & Ashbury’s General Ophthalmology, Glaucoma is characterized by the “optic disc cupping and visual field loss, usually associated with elevated intraocular pressure.” "In open-angle glaucoma, there is an imbalance in the production and drainage of the aqueous humor (clear fluid between the cornea and the lens) that fills the eyes anterior chamber." (Berdahl, John) In certain situations, too much aqueous is produced by the ciliary body inside the eye; and in other situations the drainage channels in the anterior chamber become impassable. Whichever the cause, the result is that the pressure inside the eye increases to perilous levels. When intraocular pressure increases, the pressure pushes harder against the nerve fibers of the optic nerve, which conveys visual information to the brain.
Glaucoma is several conditions of the eye that damage the optic nerve, which is vital to perfect vision. This damage is caused due to an abnormally high pressure in your eye. Glaucoma is one of the leading causes of blindness in the United States. It can happen at any age but is most common in older adults. If you lose your vision due to glaucoma, it is not possible to gain it back. It is important to get regular eye appointments because if glaucoma is caught early, the loss of vision can be slowed or prevented. There are two types of glaucoma. Open-angle glaucoma and acute angle-closure glaucoma. The symptoms for these two are very different. Open-angle glaucoma symptoms include patchy blind spots in your central or side vision,
Glaucoma occurs when there is an increase of intraocular pressure or IOP; IOP is the pressure of the fluid within the eye that builds up behind the eye (Ignatavicius & Workman, 2013). If the retinal ganglion cells degenerate, the visual field will decrease as well as the optic nerve will atrophy causing a distinctive clinical appearance (Gemenetzi, Yang, & Lotery, 2012). There are several types of glaucoma but the main two types of glaucoma; open-angle and
Glaucoma is a disease that damages the optic nerve because of extra fluid increasing pressure in the eye (Boyd). It is also the leading cause of blindness if left untreated in people over sixty Boyd states. Varieties of options are available for treatment regarding glaucoma and all are intended to lower the blood pressure and protect optic nerve (Radhakrishan and Iwach). Glaucoma can be treated with eye drops, pills, and surgery or a combination of these methods. (“Treating Glaucoma”). Right now eye drops are the first choice of treatment because they lower eye pressure, helping fluid drain better or decreasing fluid made by the eye (Radhakrishan and Iwach). As is states in the article “Treating Glaucoma” when eye drops cannot control the glaucoma,
Glaucoma is a progressive optic neuropathy characterized by degeneration of retinal ganglion cells, cupping of the optic nerve heads and visual field defects often related to elevated intraocular pressure. Glaucoma affects 70 million people worldwide, and constitutes the second largest cause of bilateral blindness in the world [1]. Primary open angle glaucoma (POAG) is a multifactorial neurodegenerative disease. Both genetic and environmental factors are thought to contribute to the pathophysiology of the disease. Glaucoma is a complex clinical trait and its inheritance has been shown to follow both Mendelian and non-Mendelian models [2].
A common misconception is that glaucoma is a singular disease, in fact, it is a collaboration of many diseases in the eyes that cause glaucoma. these diseases can often lead to loss of vision but, if caught early, glaucoma, or the smaller diseases which lead to it, can be treated. Like many other diseases, if caught early, the lasting effects will lessen.
It's important to schedule regular eye exams as you age to make sure you don't lose your vision due to glaucoma. Glaucoma is a gradual increase in the pressure inside your eye. Glaucoma starts with no symptoms, but it can ultimately cause loss of peripheral vision and blindness if left untreated. Treatment is typically a simple matter of eye drops and the glaucoma test takes only seconds to preform. It is estimated that half of the people with glaucoma don't know they have it. Make sure you're not one of them.
The goal of therapy include three key elements. Reduce and control the intraocular pressure, maintain the optic nerve and the retinal ganglion cell layer and preserve the visual field. (AAO, 2010). According to the American Academy of Ophthalmology Preferred Practice Pattern guidelines, the recommendation is to decrease the intraocular pressure to 25% less than the pretreatment pressure estimated when the diagnosis was originally made. However, depending of the severity, the risk factors associated, the side effects of the medications, the pre-existing medical conditions and the progression of the glaucoma, the intraocular target pressure can be lowered even more. The treatment is done usually with the use of monotherapy, meaning that the amount of side effects is less than when multiple drugs are employed.
Better understanding of glaucoma, requires assessment of the different components incorporate ,retinal nerve fiber layer (RNFL), and, and visual function. On the other hand, elevated intraocular pressure, are not only risk factor of glaucoma .RNFL thickness measured by optical coherence tomography (OCT) is a reliable early marker of glaucoma[1,2]. As the pathogenesis of glaucoma involves the degeneration of axons as well as cell bodies and dendrites, The primary site of axonal damage in glaucoma is thought to be the lamina cribrosa , based on findings from previous studies [3-5] ,which thought to be via several mechanisms, including mechanical damage, [6]compromised vascular supply, [7] and increased translaminar pressure gradient[8]. The main load-bearing tissue of the eye is the sclera and its deformations due to the IOP changes are transmitted to the optic nerve head (ONH). ONH cupping in glaucoma is thought to be a combination of the two components – prelaminar and laminar cupping [9]. Clinically, glaucomatous optic nerve damage is diagnosed by the deepening and extension of the optic cup ,with dimension of the neuro-retinal rim [10]. The anterior and posterior surface of the LC is well visualized on the OCT, and this may be used in understanding glaucomatous changes [11]. Optical coherence tomography is a method of using low-coherence interferometry to scan through the layers of the retina with very high axial resolution (3 to 15 μm) , for imaging disorders affecting
Glaucoma is a common and important health problem. It is one of the leading causes of blindness in Western Society (Hoskins & Kass, 1989). It is responsible for ten percent of all blindness in the United States and continues to be the second or third most common cause of blindness in the world (Bunce, Fraser, & Wormald, 1999). It is estimated that two million people in the United States have been diagnosed as having glaucoma. Glaucoma is known to affect about two percent of Caucasians beginning at the age of 40 with an increasing risk for those over the age of 60. This risk is especially high if a member of the family has glaucoma or diabetes. Further, there is a higher risk of a glaucoma diagnosis for African Americans
Glaucoma is a group of eye disorders that cause blindness by hurting the optic nerve, which is the large nerve that is responsible for vision. In glaucoma, the optic nerve damage is related to a change in the fluid pressure that circulates around the eyeball. In many cases, Glaucoma occurs when the eye's fluid pressure is high, but it can also occur when the pressure is measured as normal.
It’d better we try to think about a closed, sustainable water tank. The more level of water is poured into the tank, the greater the pressure inside it is. Similarly, high pressure inside the eye occurs - the more fluid, the greater the pressure. Moreover, the optic nerve in the eye can be destroyed by overload of the pressure.