If you think glaucoma is a disease of old age, that
it primarily strikes people with diabetes, or that
you´re safe if you have 20/20 vision - think again!
`These are myths about glaucoma - the leading
cause of preventable blindness,´ warns Dr. Steve
Briggs, a Grey-Bruce Optometrist. `The sad fact
is that too many people are in danger of losing
vision because they think they´re not at risk,´ he
says. `The tragedy is that many of the more than
10,000 Canadians who are blind as a result of
glaucoma did not have to lose their sight!'
Glaucoma can affect anyone from newborn babies
to senior citizens. In fact, about 400,000 people in
Canada have glaucoma and half of them don´t
even know they have it. The disease is called `the
sneak thief of sight´ because it usually has no
warning symptoms. But a simple, painless eye
examination can detect the disease. And with
early detection and continuing treatment, glaucoma usually can be controlled and blindness
prevented.
Every Ontario resident over age 65 is covered for an annual eye exam, and people aged 19-64
are covered every two years. Dr. Briggs urges everyone to schedule a regular eye
examination with an eye care professional. A full eye exam includes glaucoma testing. The
painless test should check the fluid pressure in your eyes, determine how well you see at
various distances, dilate your pupil with drops to inspect your optic nerve for signs of damage
and measure your visual field to ascertain if you´ve lost any side vision.
If glaucoma is diagnosed, typical treatment is daily eye drops to keep intra-ocular pressures
down. If this proves ineffective, there are laser procedures that can be done to increase fluid
drainage from the eye, and lower pressures that way. It's important to remember that even if
your pressures are normal, you may still have glaucoma. The definitive test is a computerized
test of your peripheral vision, called autoperimetry.
Glaucoma is a poorly understood eye disease, but research continues. Recent experiments in
animals with a drug that curbed the action of NOS-2, an enzyme that makes nitric oxide,
slowed down and possibly prevented the loss of retinal ganglion cells (RGCs), the crucial nerve
cells so important to sight.
Dr. Steve Briggs - Dr. Liane Pitre 1701 3rd Ave. East, Owen Sound, Ont. N4K 2M3 (519)376-3937
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