Glaucoma Starts in the Brain

[bananas]

http://news.discovery.com/human/glaucoma-diagnosis-treatment-brain.html

Glaucoma Starts in the Brain
Blindness from glaucoma, which afflicts more than 65 million people worldwide, starts with an injury in the brain, not the eye.

By Irene Klotz | Tue Mar 16, 2010 06:29 AM ET


THE GIST:

* Researchers, unexpectedly, find that glaucoma kills off part of the brain, rather than the eye, first.
* Glaucoma is expected to afflict 80 million people worldwide by 2020.
* Study ties glaucoma to other neurodegenerative disorders, such as Alzheimer's.



In what may be a turning point in glaucoma research, scientists have determined that the disease -- the leading cause of irreversible blindness -- shows up first in the brain, not the eye. The finding ties it to other neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's diseases.

A team headed by David Calkins, director of research at Vanderbilt University's Eye Institute, made the discovery after injecting glaucoma-afflicted rodents with a special fluorescent dye that illuminated sections of the middle of the brain where the optic nerve forms its first connections.

They found that the first signs of the disease were not, as expected, in the retina. Instead, it turned that out the earliest damage was at the other end of the optic nerve, in the mid-brain, which lost its ability to receive information from optic nerve fibers.

<snip>

The research was published in the March 1 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[Warpy]

1. I had a grand aunt with glaucoma

and it finally blinded her, drops and all. Too bad I didn't know about grass, I'd have shared my stash. Really.

I don't know about the tie to dementia, though, she made it to 99 and was pretty sharp until the end, although she said she was tired and ready to go home.

[WheelWalker]

2. Oh, that's just great. Now can I have the Public Option, please?

[RagAss]

3. Does color blindness start there too? I thought I heard that once.

[Eurobabe]

4. Wow, this is fascinating, my mother's side of the family

ALL has glaucoma: my grandma, her brother, my mom. Thanks for posting, I wonder what further research will reveal, a virus connection or autoimmune type disorder?