Most people don't develop diabetic retinopathy until they've had diabetes for at least 10 years. Keeping your blood sugar at an even level can help prevent diabetic retinopathy. If you have high blood pressure, keeping that under control is helpful as well. In the early stages of diabetic retinopathy, you might have no symptoms at all, or you might have blurred vision. In the later stages, you develop cloudy vision, blind spots or floaters .
Nonproliferative retinopathy is the early stage, where small retinal blood vessels break and leak.
In proliferative retinopathy, new blood vessels grow abnormally within the retina. This new growth can cause scarring or retinal detachment , which can lead to vision loss. The new blood vessels may also grow or bleed into the vitreous humor, the transparent gel filling the eyeball in front of the retina. Proliferative retinopathy is much more serious than the nonproliferative form and can lead to total blindness. Early treatment can slow the progression of diabetic retinopathy, but is not likely to reverse any vision loss.