For years, glaucoma was defined as elevated pressure within the eye that leads to vision loss. And for years experts knew there were glaring gaps in that definition. Many people with abnormally high intraocular pressure never develop glaucoma. As many as one in three people who do get the disease have normal or even low pressure.
As researchers have tried to resolve those contradictions, a new paradigm for understanding glaucoma has emerged. Glaucoma isn’t simply an eye disease, experts now say, but rather a degenerative nerve disorder, not unlike Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease.