Cause of blindness

May 16 2008 by Our Correspondent, Huddersfield Daily Examiner

GLAUCOMA is the leading cause of preventable blindness in the UK today.

About 2% of the population over the age of 40 have glaucoma, but half of them are undiagnosed and in danger of progressive irreversible sight loss. Early diagnosis of the condition is essential to prevent debilitating sight loss, but because people are unaware that they might be at risk, they don’t have their eyes tested regularly.

How can this happen? Glaucoma is usually caused by the build-up of pressure within the eye, which gradually damages the optic nerve. It is rare for sufferers to feel any pain or have any other obvious symptoms. To make matters worse, if you have glaucoma and start to lose sight, one eye will fill in for the other and the brain compensates, so it is not until significant damage occurs that you notice there are areas of blindness.

Often this will mean that an undiagnosed sufferer will start having more trips and falls and if they are driving may miss cars overtaking or even people or children crossing the road.

What should we do? As the progression of glaucoma damage cannot yet be reversed, only stopped or slowed, treating the condition is much more likely to preserve an individual’s quality of life if glaucoma is detected early.

During National Glaucoma Awareness Week our aim is to encourage everyone over the age of 40 to have a regular (once every two years) routine eye test that includes all three glaucoma tests (ophthalmoscopy, tonometry and perimetry) whether or not they believe anything is wrong with their vision. Needless visual loss and blindness due to glaucoma can be avoided.

David J Wright FIAM FRSA

Chief Executive, International Glaucoma Association