Glaucoma is a disorder that causes blindness. It is caused from unusually high pressure from aqueous humor accumulation in the anterior cavity of the eyeball. According to Gerard Tortora and Bryan Derrickson, “the aqueous fluid compresses the lens of the eye into the vitreous body and applies pressure to the neurons of the retina” (Tortora and Derrickson 674). The disorder itself is painless and tends to be more prominent in the older generation.

Glaucoma has affected more than 2.7 million people in the U.S. alone that are aged 40 years or older. Researchers believe that advances in technology uses for diagnosis and therapy have caused the number of blindness from glaucoma to half since 1980. The study was conducted by a team from the MayoClinic where the researched reviewed 857 cases of open-angle glaucoma from 1965-2009 in Olmsted County, Minnisota. They found that the population of blindness in people within 10 years of diagnosis decreased from 8.7 per 100,000 to 5.5 per 100,000 [American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO)]

Arthur J. Sit,M.D. said that these results are promising to those suffering from glaucoma and their doctors. I have to agree with him on the outcome of the research conducted. I can’t imagine being blind and not being able to see what is going on in my everyday life. I feel that this could possibly lead to even a cure for the disease since they have found a way to decrease the number of cases by half.

American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO). “Probability of blindness from glaucoma has nearly halved.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 21 January 2014. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2014/01/140121104107.htm>.

Tortora, Gerard J., and Derrickson, Bryan. Principles of Anatomy & Phisiology .13th ed.  Hoboken: John  Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2011. Print.