Eye Disease Management at Apple Valley Eye Center
Eye diseases can spell serious trouble for your quality of life. Although passing problems such as infections often resolve themselves or need little more than soothing remedies, chronic, progressive eye diseases can limit or even completely destroy your eyesight. That's why you need to understand how your optometrist at Apple Valley Eye Center can help you with your eye disease management needs in Yakima, WA.
Common Eye Diseases That Require Management
A variety of diseases and disorders can create slow but often irreversible changes in the structure and health of the eye, in many cases leading to low vision or even legal or total blindness if they go undiagnosed and untreated. Examples include:
- Glaucoma - In this disease, abnormal fluid pressure in the eye damages the optic nerves. Most sufferers have open-angle glaucoma, which steals vision slowly over time. Others develop narrow-angle glaucoma, which can cause severe vision loss very quickly.
- Cataracts - Cataracts develop when the proteins in the lens of the eye grow into solid, milk-white obstructions that prevent light from entering the eye normally.
- Macular degeneration - This disease, which commonly strikes seniors, causes swelling, bleeding, and damage to the macula (that part of the retina that lets you see objects in the center of your visual field). As a result, you might lose central vision while retaining peripheral vision.
- Diabetic retinopathy - Another retinal disorder, diabetic retinopathy occurs when the delicate blood vessels in the eye sustain damage from high blood sugar levels. In some cases, abnormal blood vessels and bleeding inside the eye can develop.
Eye Disease Management Techniques and Options
The first critical stage in eye disease management involves diagnosing the disease in question. Regular eye exams can prove critical for catching an eye disease while treatment may still slow or arrest its progress. Our Yakima, WA, optometrist at our eye clinic can then recommend the right form of treatment for your eye disease at its current stage.
Optometrists can manage some eye diseases with medication. For instance, glaucoma usually responds well to drugs that encourage eye fluid drainage or restrict fluid production. Early-stage cataracts can benefit from prescription eyewear and other conservative management techniques. If cataracts require surgery, we can handle the pre op and post op care.
Give Your Eyes What They Need in Yakima, WA
Eye disease may or not present you with immediate, obvious symptoms. Whether you experience such symptoms or not, schedule an appointment at Apple Valley Eye Center so our Yakima, WA, optometrist can check for the earliest trouble signs and start you on a successful course of eye disease management.
