Here is something that I suppose everybody has thought about at least once; according new research released Australia’s greatest fear is going blind. It was revealed that the fear of going blind out ranked a fear of heights, spiders or lightning strikes .The research also revealed 87% of Australians surveyed most valued their sense of sight. Now consider of the approximate seven million standard eye checks performed each year in Australia, only 46% of Australians think they have been tested for Glaucoma before. You also need to realise that 1 in 200 Australians over the age of 40 will develop glaucoma
“The good news is that vision loss from glaucoma is usually preventable, especially if caught early. A simple eye check involving the optic disc and measurement of the eye pressure are all that is required for an early diagnosis,” Associate Professor Ivan Goldberg, President and Co-Founder of Glaucoma Australia, commented.
There is one last thing that you need to remember the next time you are at the Optometrist that over 300,000 Australians have glaucoma, which is equivalent to almost the entire population of Canberra. Of these, almost 40,000 suffer vision loss or blindness.