Glaucoma is a common condition that can damage your optic nerve and lead to permanent vision loss. The bad news? There’s no cure available for glaucoma. The good news? Glaucoma eye drops such as Careprost 3ml and oral medications can help slow down or stop the progression of glaucoma.
Some types of glaucoma don’t usually cause any symptoms at all before you start losing your vision. To prevent total vision loss from glaucoma, the best thing you can do is to get eye exams regularly so that the condition could be diagnosed and treated at an earlier stage.
This article will look at the different types of glaucoma along with the best glaucoma treatment.
What Are The Types Of Glaucoma?
There are two types of glaucoma:
- Primary glaucoma
- Secondary glaucoma
Primary Glaucomas
Primary glaucoma is also called chronic glaucoma and is caused due to high pressure in the eye, which is known as intraocular pressure. High eye pressure usually develops due to inadequate drainage of fluid from the eye. With time, high pressure in the eye can damage the optic nerve leading to vision loss.
Following are the four types of primary glaucomas:
- Open-angle glaucoma
- Open-angle glaucoma is also commonly called wide-angle glaucoma.
- It is one of the most common types of glaucoma and accounts for nearly 90% of glaucoma cases.
- Open-angle glaucoma is a chronic condition that develops very slowly.
- People with open-angle glaucoma usually experience no symptoms until partial vision loss occurs.
- Scientists aren’t sure what causes open-angle glaucoma, but it may be caused due to high eye pressure (called intraocular pressure). When the eye fluid couldn’t drain fast enough, it induces pressure that pushes the optic nerve located at the back of your eye.
- Over time, high eye pressure damages the optic nerve which can impact your vision. This may ultimately lead to permanent blindness.
- African Americans and people with high blood pressure are at significant risk for developing glaucoma.
2.Closed-angle glaucoma
- Closed-angle glaucoma is also called angle-closure or narrow-angle.
- It is a medical emergency; consult your doctor immediately if you suddenly experience blurred vision, intense pain in your eye, red eyes, nausea, etc.
- In this type of glaucoma, the outer edge of the iris does not allow fluid to drain out from the front of your eye. The fluid builds up within your eye, which leads to a sudden increase in intraocular pressure.
- Closed-angle glaucoma can cause blindness within just a couple of days. So, please don’t ignore its symptoms.
- Your doctor can recommend glaucoma eye drops such as Careprost or use laser treatment to drain fluid from your eye and relieve high eye pressure.
3. Normal-tension glaucoma
- It is a type of open-angle glaucoma.
- It affects people with normal eye pressure; studies suggest that about 1 in 3 individuals with open-angle glaucoma have this type.
- Having low blood pressure, irregular heartbeat, and family history with normal-tension glaucoma makes you more susceptible to developing the condition.
- Scientists don’t know what exactly causes normal-tension glaucoma, but studies reveal that glaucoma eye drops such as Careprost which helps lower intraocular pressure can slow down the progression of glaucoma and stop vision loss.
4. Congenital glaucoma
- Babies who are born with glaucoma are known to have congenital glaucoma. In the United States, about 1 in 10,000 babies are born with a defect in the eye, which prevents the eye fluid from draining out normally.
- The signs of congenital glaucoma include cloudy eyes, increased sensitivity to light, larger than normal eyes, eyes producing excessive tears, etc.
- Doctors usually perform surgery in babies with congenital glaucoma. If the surgery is done early enough, it can help prevent permanent vision loss.
- Children can also have other types of glaucoma. Any type of glaucoma which affects babies or children is called “pediatric glaucoma”.
Secondary glaucomas
Secondary glaucoma is usually caused due to external reasons including diabetes, inflammation of the eye, damage caused to the eye, use of corticosteroids, etc. As in the case of primary glaucoma, high eye pressure can cause damage to the optic nerve and lead to vision loss. Secondary glaucomas are usually detected while treating the underlying cause.
Following are the four types of secondary glaucomas:
- Pigmentary glaucoma
- It occurs when the pigment granules from the iris (colored part of your eye) flake off into the aqueous humor and increases intraocular pressure intermittently.
- Pigmentary glaucoma is one of the very few types of glaucoma which occurs in young people, specifically white young men who are nearsighted.
- The common symptoms of pigmentary glaucoma include blurry vision or seeing rainbow-colored rings around lights, particularly during exercising.
- Healthcare providers usually recommend glaucoma eye drops like Careprost 3ml to lower eye pressure and treat pigmentary glaucoma. But there isn’t any way yet discovered to keep pigmentation from getting detached from the iris.
2. Neovascular glaucoma
- It happens when your eye produces extra blood vessels that cover the part of the eye from where the eye fluid drains out.
- Neovascular glaucoma is generally caused due to other medical conditions such as high blood pressure or diabetes.
- Its common symptoms include redness or pain in your eye and vision loss.
- It’s quite difficult to treat neovascular glaucoma. The doctor will need to address the underlying medical condition (such as high blood pressure or diabetes) and use glaucoma eye drops such as Careprost 3ml to reduce the intraocular pressure that stems from it.
3. Exfoliation glaucoma
- Exfoliation glaucoma is also known as pseudoexfoliation glaucoma.
- It is a type of open-angle glaucoma that occurs in people with exfoliation syndrome, which is a condition that causes excess material to detach from the parts of your eye and keep the eye fluid from draining.
- Studies have found genetics to be closely linked with the condition. That means if someone else in your family has exfoliation glaucoma, you can have it too.
- It progresses fast and usually causes high eye pressure. If you are at high risk for exfoliation glaucoma, kindly make sure to get frequent eye exams.
4. Uveitic glaucoma
- People with uveitis are at an increased risk for developing uveitic glaucoma. Studies suggest that about 2 in 10 people develop uveitic glaucoma from uveitis.
- Scientists aren’t sure how uveitis leads to uveitic glaucoma but they believe that it might happen because uveitis causes inflammation and the formation of scar tissue in the middle of the eye. This could block or damage the part of the eye that drains out the fluid, causing high intraocular pressure which ultimately can lead to uveitic glaucoma.
- In some cases, uveitis medications are also helpful to relieve uveitic glaucoma, but they could also make it worse. This is primarily because the corticosteroid medications may cause increased eye pressure (high intraocular pressure) as a side effect.
Glaucoma Eye Drops – Which One Should You Choose?
Both primary and secondary types of glaucomas can be treated with glaucoma medications including glaucoma eye drops such as Careprost 3ml or oral medications. For secondary glaucomas, the underlying condition also needs to be treated.
If glaucoma eye drops or oral medications don’t work, your doctor will recommend laser therapy or minimally invasive surgery to improve the eye fluid drainage.
Careprost 3ml is known to be the best glaucoma eye drops widely used to treat high pressure within the eyes. It is suitable for most children and adults and could be used alone or in combination with glaucoma medications to alleviate high eye pressure.
Use Careprost regularly by following all the instructions of your healthcare provider for the best results. Never stop using the medication unless your doctor tells you to, or else the pressure in the eyes might increase and cause damage to your sight.
At the time of purchase, make sure the seal of the Careprost is intact. If you wear contact lenses, kindly remove them before using Careprost and wait for at least 15-20 minutes before putting them back.
