More than 3 million Americans suffer from the disease. It's the leading cause of vision loss, yet half of the people with glaucoma don't know they have it. Everyone is at risk and that risk increases with age. They passed along tips on what to look for. These include a sense of elevated pressure inside the eye, and changes to the optic nerve and loss of peripheral vision.
Various treatments exist.
After a positive diagnosis from monitoring the IOP, and a dilated exam of the optic nerve, care normally consists of eye drops, pills, or medications such as pilocarpine, epinephrine, betaxolol, apraclonidine or a beta-blocker such as timolol. A latter option might be laser surgery such as trabeculoplasty, a painless procedure which helps the eye's fluid to drain better. Traditional surgery, called trabeculectomy, done on an outpatient basis or brief hospital stay is one in which the eye's drain, or meshwork is removed, also allowing easier drainage. But the first step is detection.