Can you have severe pain with glaucoma?

Answer 1

Unfortunately, glaucoma can cause severe eye pain that can happen fairly suddenly and without warning. However, the majority of cases seen in the United States of do not involve any pain or noticeably vision loss. Some eye doctors believe that the latter can be worse because the patient can be slowly losing vision but would not know about it until only severe vision loss has occurred at which point it is too late to treat effectively.

The most common type of glaucoma known to cause severe pain in the eye is known as acute angle glaucoma. When you have an acute angle closure attack, you can experience high levels of pain in addition to redness of the eyes and blurred vision. Your optometrist or ophthalmologist will find that the eye pressure can be considerably elevated using tonometry. In addition, using a special lens, your eye doctor can perform gonioscopy to determine the portion of your eye that is blocking fluid from escaping the eye. When the fluid inside the eye is not allowed to properly flow out, it leads to excess accumulation of fluid leading to increase intraocular pressure. This because the eye can continue to produce more fluid, or aqueous humor, in the chamber at the front of the eye yet which cannot exit as quickly as it is being produced. The worst case scenario of acute angle closure glaucoma is permanent vision loss.

The pain is usually associated with the front part of the eye when acute angle glaucoma occurs. The cornea can actually swell, causing blurred vision. Normally, fluid inside the cornea is regulated by the endothelial cells. However, when there is excess pressure behind the cornea the fluid behind the cornea can more readily enter the cornea leading to corneal swelling or edema. The cornea has a lot of pain sensors and nerve endings which may lead to symptoms of pain. In the addition, when the iris or uvea is inflammed as a result of an acute attack this can also lead to severe pain and even light sensitivity.