Did I mention that I was seeing a new optometrist? My previous optometrist was fairly far away and was always, always running late. My new optometrist is much closer and is on time. Plus they do more tests there, including a visual field test and optical coherence tomography, a test that measures the retinal nerve fiber layer. I see my optometrist every six months in part because my prescription is so high.
One thing this optometrist has discovered is that my eye pressure (the technical term is intraocular pressure) is also high. On the automatic test, my eyes register a pressure of about 25 (12-22 is apparently normal), and on the manual test, my eyes register a pressure of about 22. My optometrist says that my eyes are deep-set and so they don't register properly on the automatic test, giving a higher-than-normal reading, but my eye pressure is still at the high end of normal during the manual test.
We've done the optical coherence tomography each of the three times I've been to this optometrist and the results have been unchanged in the year and a half. This is good: high eye pressure can mean glaucoma, but the retinal nerve fiber layer doesn't show any glaucoma. Therefore, my optometrist has diagnosed me with ocular hypertension (high eye pressure).
My optometrist and I talked it over and we've decided not to treat the ocular hypertension right now but to just watch it. I'll continue going in every six months and if the pressure gets any higher or the retinal nerve fiber layer shows any changes, we'll treat it then.
So that's two new things going on: my stomach issues (which flared up again last night and today) and this ocular hypertension. Lucky me.
1 comment:
I didn't realize you could get high pressure in your eyes. They do those tests on me but I don't remember asking about them. Except once they said the results were skewed because my prescription is high. Good for you for going every six months!
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