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A couple of weeks ago I suddenly suffered from high IOP on one eye, resulting from a 20 year affliction with Fuchs Uveitis Syndrome where glaucoma is known to be the main complication. The IOP was 40/10 but came down quickly with diamox and eyedrops (cosopt and xalatan) and the good news is that there is no damage to the optic nerve yet, according to my opthalmologist. Since the event IOP was monitored weekly, and turned out OK at 17/15 and 16/16. I have now been told to stop with medication and IOP will be checked again in a few days.

Presented at AAO, Chicago

The use of intravitreal injections of vascular endothelial growth factor inhibitors (anti-VEGF) to treat diseases such as age-related "wet" macular degeneration (AMD), may also put some patients at risk of elevated intraocular pressure (IOP) and therefore at risk of vision loss due to glaucoma. According to data presented here October 17 at the Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Ophthalmology (AAO), potentially dangerous increases in IOP have been seen in some patients who have had multiple injections of drugs such as bevacizumab and ranibizumab.

Hello Sir,

I'm a resident of Saudi Arabia and was in need of a Glaucoma Specialist since a long time. My father is suffering from acute glaucoma and has been operated twice but the intraocular pressure is constantly increasing 26-28. He is a diabetic, suffering from hypertension, and has completely lost one of his eye vision.

On Thu, Oct 28, 2010 at 5:17 PM, a FitEyes member wrote:
Dear Dave,
How are you? I miss your comments in the Fiteyes.com blog.
Is everything Ok?

Interesting article today about how CCSVI ("Cerebrospinal Venous Insufficiency") is being used as a  new and surprisingly effective treatement for MS.  The description of the problem, "strictures or blockages in the veins that drain blood from the brain and spinal cord, the blood backs up in the brain" makes it sound like it may be a viable treatment for high IOP as well.

The treatment is venoplasty, using a balloon to free up the blockage in the veins. 

Today we made some progress in the denial area.  This condition ( high IOP and glaucoma ) is very difficult to accept.  The prospect of loosing my vision is bad enough.  Completely restructing our disposable income to make a tonometer purchace is not a given.  It seems to be drifting in that direction though. The tonometer is being considered only for the purpose of minimizing drugs and their side effects.  But will I be able to control all the variables?

After obtaining the Reichert 7CR and understand my eyes response to different situations, times of day and other stimuli, this first set of result is very encouraging for me after this small changes I have made.

Since I am the type of person using the left-brain, as is described in this post, as part of several tests performed simultaneously I eliminate caffeine from my diet in all its forms.

http://fiteyes.com/mistake-of-the-intellect

Does anynone here know of technique consisting of compressing one's eyeball to open Schlemms's canal and thus opening it? My doctor recommended me to do this 3 times a day and it results. After compressing the eyeball, my IOP goes down significantly. Yesterday I went to an Optical firm (an optometrist) and, when i entered ther, my tension was at 35. After compressing the eyeball it went down to 22 and after compressing it again, it went down to 18.

I was wearing the glasses with an incorrect prescription for the last few months and now when I went to the eye doctor, he said I am suspect for glaucoma due to slightly elevated eye pressure.  Can a bad eyeglass px cause this????

Hello fellow research members,

  In an effort to fill the need for a tonometer stand which will hold our tonometers in a tilted posion at the edge of our beds I have come up with this design. David has been very helpful in explaining how this device would need to function for full effectiveness. 

For the second time this year my IOP hit 24.   I am 58 .  My mother went blind from glaucoma ( in the boston area no less ) in about 2002 at the age of 72.  She had been doing everything U Mass hospitals and associated doctors could come up with operations , stents, drugs  etc.   My younger brother lost significant vision in one eye at 43 ( about 2005).  I was hoping I had my dad's physiology but alas more evidence that I don't.  Although now at 90 my dad has macular degeneration ( wet ).  My results so far are no damage yet so technically it is not glaucoma.  Optomologists prescribes xalat

I came across an article about rolfing which makes it sound quite useful/healthy.

Ref:www.nytimes.com/2010/10/07/fashion/07rolfing.html

But the pain issue makes me suspicious that it may increase IOP.  Has anyone measured their IOP before/during/after rolfing?   And if you have and the results were positive, do you have any recommendations for those of us who have not rolfed?  Eg, are there any precautions, techniques to avoid, or techniques to request?

I have some questions about glaucoma.  I haven't been officially diagnosed but until recently, my IOP was running about 20-21 in both eyes and according to the range of vision test, I seem to be losing  a little sight in one eye...although I plan to ace that test next time!  The last couple of visits, my IOP was down to 16.

I find this whole thing confusing...my investigation shows that one can have elevated IOP and NOT get glaucoma and also one can have low IOP and still get it.  I also found that those rx drops are not without possible serious side-effects.

 How does one practice serene impulse that will lower eye pressure (or keep it under control)?

I received the following response from a FitEyes reader on another topic. But his last comment prompted something I want to share with everyone. So please read on, starting with an edited excerpt from his comment that inspired me.

[I am on] on a six month trial doing alternate day fasting, twenty minute mindful meditative walks in nature twice a day, 30 minutes of aerobic exercise every other day, while detoxing with hexagonal water.

[I am] 10% persuaded that [I] will permanently lower [my] intraocular pressure to 10 mm Hg  in six months.

That last line really caught my attention. Here is my response:

The blog post contains several articles. Keep scrolling down past the references at the end of each article to read the next article.

Section Leaders: Makoto Araie, Robert Ritch, Clement Tham

Contributors: Makoto Aihara, Aiko Iwase, Sandra Fernando, Michael S Kook, Simon Law, Robert Nussenblatt, Vincenzo Parisi, Nathan Radcliffe, Douglas Rhee, Kwok-Fai So, Raymond Chuen-Chung CHANG, He Wei, Lori Ventura

Consensus points

• Plant extracts have been used medicinally throughout history. Every society has plants used medicinally
• Even dogs eat grass when sick, while chimpanzees consume a variety of non-food plants medicinally. This is learned behavior
• Our modern pharmacopoiea of drugs were originally synthesized from plants used medicinally. These include vitamin C, digitalis, penicillin, and pilocarpine.
• Chinese traditional medicine in its written form dates back 5000 years.
• Technically speaking, vitamins fall into this category. We depend on essential vitamins from food for survival. There is a fine line between nutrition and medicinal uses of plants.
• It was only in the 20th century, with the advent of single molecule products synthesized and patented by pharmaceutical companies and U.S. medical school philosophiesthat other non-pharmaceutical traditional medications came under attack, leading often to their being ridiculed and held in contempt.Thus, in order to get away from this view, we prefer the term “non-pharmaceutical therapy” to “alternative” or “complementary”
• Many available natural compounds used as “non-pharmaceutical therapy” have been reported to show beneficial effects on circulation, the immune system, and neuroprotective activities in vitro and in vivo.
• The mechanism of action of neuroprotection most common to natural compounds is antioxidant/free radical scavenging activity. However, many other actions are present and some extracts, such as Gingko biloa and curcumin have widespread activity on a number of enzyme systems.

• Comment: Some of these compounds reportedly modify expression of enzymes relating to excitotoxicity, apoptosis, inflammation, lipid peroxidation, or immune stimulation. Some of these compounds have undergone clinical trials to evidence their effects on systemic diseases, including neurodegenerative disorders.

Here are the links to Robert's current articles:

There was a big surprise for me as I have had today my eye HRT exam. I decided to do the HRT after two months after the recent test as I was curious whether there was any effect from the changes which I have seen in my IOPs (which originated about two months ago).

Quite unexpectedly for me the scan of my eye nerve is, I believe, showing improvement. I haven't discussed this with my doc yet as I have a scheduled visit for next month. BTW my state today when taking the eye exam was far from perfect: I had higher than usual IOP due to a nasty cold and stuffed sinuses.