What causes glaucoma?
Although increased pressure within the eye, which ultimately damages the optic nerve, is the primary cause of glaucoma, that’s not always the case. Some people who have normal intraocular pressure develop optic-nerve damage and vision loss, a condition referred to as normal or low-tension glaucoma. Similarly, some people with elevated intraocular pressure, a condition often called ocular hypertension, never develop glaucoma and visual loss. (These rare cases are best monitored closely by an ophthalmologist.) Clearly, there are other factors at play besides ocular pressure that cause glaucoma; research is underway to discover underlying causes of the disease. In any event, if you have glaucoma and don’t receive prompt and effective treatment, your vision will gradually deteriorate from the edges inward, until you can no longer see in your central line of sight and blindness develops. The damage that occurs in glaucoma is irreversible. Who Gets Glaucoma? No one is immune to glaucoma, but
