Glaucoma

In a healthy eye, a clear fluid called aqueous humor circulates inside the front portion of your eye. To maintain a constant healthy eye pressure, your eye continually produces a small amount of aqueous humor while an equal amount of this fluid flows out of your eye. If you have glaucoma, the aqueous humor does not flow out of the eye properly. Fluid pressure in the eye builds up and causes damage to the optic nerve.

Only about half of Americans who have glaucoma know they have the disease. Glaucoma is a leading cause of blindness for people over 60 years old. Glaucoma progresses slowly with few early symptoms, eventually leading to increasing loss of peripheral or side vision. If left untreated, damage to the optic nerve can lead to blindness. With regular eye exams, the physicians at Columbia Eye Clinic can detect glaucoma early and treat it to help stop vision loss.

Open-angle glaucoma is the most common type of the disease. In this form of the disease fluid does not drain as well as it should, like a clogged drain, resulting in increased eye pressure.

Angle-closure glaucoma also called narrow-angle glaucoma, occurs when fluid drainage from the eye is completely blocked and eye pressure rises very quickly. This type of acute attack is an emergency and if not treated right away, can cause blindness.

These are the signs of an acute angle-closure glaucoma attack. They may come and go at first or get worse steadily.

• Sudden, severe pain in one eye
• Decreased or cloudy vision
• Nausea and vomiting
• Rainbow-like halos around lights
• Red eye
• Eye feels swollen
• Pain above the eyebrows

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