If you’ve just received a glaucoma diagnosis, you likely have a lot of questions. Your doctor may have given you so much information that it’s difficult to take it all in at once, or perhaps the doctor hasn’t given you much information at all. Either way, a basic fact sheet can help you understand and get more comfortable with what glaucoma is, and what it may mean for you. Here are five facts to know about glaucoma.* 

Glaucoma facts for the newly-diagnosed

It’s not one disease

Glaucoma is actually a set of diseases that affect the optic nerve, a bundle of nerve fibers at the back of each eye that sends visual information to the brain. In most cases, this damage comes from increased intraocular pressure (IOP), your internal eye pressure. There are several different types of glaucoma:

• Primary open-angle (the most common in the United States) 
• Angle-closed, and acute angle-closed
• Normal-tension (in which the optic nerve is damaged despite normal IOP)
• Congenital (a form that a person is born with)

It’s asymptomatic in its early stages

If you’re wondering how you went from seeming perfectly fine to receiving a glaucoma diagnosis, you’re not alone. Glaucoma is often called “the sneak thief of sight” because most people won’t experience any signs or symptoms until the disease is advanced and the optic nerve has sustained irreparable damage. 

This is why getting regular, comprehensive eye exams is so important, even for people who think their eyes are healthy. Early detection can help prevent further damage and preserve vision. Keeping eye appointments is just as important once you have a diagnosis, as intervention at any stage can help prevent further vision loss.

Some groups of people are at higher risk than others 

In the U.S., Black and Hispanic people are more likely to develop open-angle glaucoma, while Asian people and Pacific Islanders are at greater risk of developing angle-closure. Japanese people are at highest risk for normal-tension. People aged 65 and over are also more prone to developing glaucoma, though a type called juvenile glaucoma affects 1 in 50,000 people between the ages of three and 40.

People with family history of glaucoma and people who use steroids are also at higher risk for glaucoma. The steroids can be in eye drops or in systemic medications such as pills or inhalers.  

Symptoms can differ between glaucoma types 

Open-angle glaucoma symptoms involve a blurring and then eventual loss of peripheral (side, or corner vision), which can make walking, and especially driving, dangerous. You may not realize that you can’t see out of the corners of your eye because your brain will fill in what it thinks you should see there, based on what you see directly in front of you.

While open-angle glaucoma develops over years, even decades, acute angle-closure glaucoma can appear as a sudden episode involving:

• Severe eye pain and/or headache
• Halos around lights
• Nausea and vomiting
• Eye redness
• Blurry vision

Acute angle-closure episodes are medical emergencies. Seek immediate emergency attention in order to prevent blindness.

There are many treatment options available

The potential to lose part or all of your vision can be scary, and glaucoma currently has no cure. The only approved factor for treatment at this time is to reduce your intraocular pressure. Fortunately, many treatment options are available to help slow the disease progression. These include:

• Medicated eye drops
• Laser therapy
• Micro- and minimally-invasive surgeries
• Combinations of the above

The most important thing to remember is that glaucoma is treatable, and that it is possible to live with glaucoma for many years without ever going blind.

*Glaukos Corporation. (2022, February 7). Seven Facts You Should Know About Glaucoma. Living with Glaucoma. https://livingwithglaucoma.com/2022/02/07/seven-facts-you-should-know-about-glaucoma/