March 7th to 13th is Glaucoma  Week

Glaucoma is a leading cause of blindness, a condition that causes damage to your eye's optic nerve.

Glaucoma usually strikes when the Intraocular pressure increases the inner eye pressure. 

The intraocular pressure rises when the required fluid does not drain from the eyes.

• Anyone can get glaucoma, which usually occurs in both eyes and may affect each eye differently. 
• Glaucoma also tends to run in families and may not show up until later in life. 
• Some other causes of glaucoma are a severe eye infection, a blockage of blood vessels in the eye, or inflammatory conditions of the eye. 
• Glaucoma may arise from a blunt or chemical injury to the eye.
• Even previous corrective eye surgery.

There are two tyoes of glaucoma.

Primary Open-Angle Glaucoma: 

The most common form of glaucoma is primary open angle happens when the eye's drainage canals become clogged over time.

In its early stages, it is typically a slow process. No pain, but a loss of peripheral or side vision, left untreated vision decreases until vision loss occurs.

Angle-Closure Glaucoma: 

 This type of glaucoma is also known as narrow-angle or acute glaucoma and occurs less commonly.

With this kind of glaucoma, eye pressure usually rises very quickly includes headaches, eye pain, nausea, rainbows around lights at night, and very blurred vision.

Early identification: 

Early discovery of glaucoma is vital to protecting your vision and keeping the disease from getting worse. Timely treatment reduces your risk of vision loss. 

Treatment: 

There is no cure for glaucoma. But it can be treated through the sustained lowering of your eye pressure and keep it from getting worse.

• With open-angle glaucoma, eye drops treatment can help your eyes make less fluid. Or can help drain the fluid properly from your eyes. 
•  Laser surgery can also make it easier for fluid to leave the eye.

In contrast, the treatment of angle-closure glaucoma usually involves either laser or conventional surgery to unblock the drainage canals that the extra fluid can drain. 

• A trabeculectomy surgery creates a new channel to drain the fluid and reduce the intraocular pressure that causes glaucoma.
• If you have angle-closure glaucoma in one eye, your doctor may also treat the other eye as a safety precaution. 
• The regular use of eye drops also is prescribed.

Regular comprehensive dilated eye exams are a valuable health care intervention.

Since glaucoma tends to run in families, know if you have a family history of this condition, attending eye checkups is essential to vision health.