Your eyes provide you with an invaluable ability, and it is important to take care of them by seeing your eye doctor for a vision checkup. Besides regular aging affecting your vision, there are many types of diseases that can worsen and damage your eyes and vision. Here are two diseases that can affect your vision and their related symptoms you should look for to help you know when to see your doctor.
Type 1 Diabetes
Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease that causes your body's pancreas to stop producing insulin. As a result, the glucose in your body remains in your blood stream and is not delivered to different parts of your body and cannot be used for energy. As the amount of unused glucose collects in your blood stream, this results in extreme thirst, blurred vision, fatigue, dizziness, and nausea. If you experience any of these symptoms, it is important to see your doctor for a confirmed diagnoses so you can begin treatment to manage the disease. Then, it is a good idea to see your eye doctor every year to check your eyes. Your eye doctor will dilate your eyes and check them for diabetic eye disease.
According to the CDC, there are 12,000 to 24,000 new cases of blindness every year from diabetic retinopathy in the United States. This eye disease associated with type 1 diabetes occurs when your blood glucose levels remain high for too long, then the glucose in your blood damages the blood vessels in your retina, which causes your retina to become swollen. The blood vessels can leak and bleed into your eye, leaving spots in your vision and leading to blindness if it is not treated.
Some symptoms of diabetic retinopathy include eye floaters, blurry and distorted or fluctuating vision, eye pain, and a shadow in your field of vision. If your retinopathy becomes advanced, there are treatments available to help improve your vision, such as laser surgery and vitrectomy to remove the damaged blood vessels and scar tissue in your eye. Then, you can work with your endocrinologist to better control your blood glucose levels to prevent further vision damage.
Taking steps to better control your blood glucose levels can include checking your blood glucose levels more often and correcting them with insulin injections when necessary. Then, exercise and eat healthy to further help keep your blood glucose levels in a proper range.
Multiple Sclerosis
Multiple sclerosis (MS) is a disease that affects your body's central nervous system, causing the myelin that coats your body's nerve fibers to become inflamed and destroyed. This destruction to the covering of your nerve fibers disrupts communication from your brain to various parts of your body and can eventually destroy your nerves permanently. Included with myelin destruction are many different symptoms, including weakness, trouble balancing, memory problems, bladder problems, numbness and tingling, and blurred vision.
Blurred vision and vision loss with undiagnosed multiple sclerosis may lead you to see your eye doctor for a checkup, as it is one of the symptoms. Then, at your eye doctor's office, your eye doctor can recommend you have an MRI to scan your brain to see if there is any nerve inflammation in your brain and diagnose MS. You can also be tested for MS with a spinal tap to remove and test a sample of your spinal fluid.
When you have been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, your life expectancy may not be shortened depending upon the type of MS you have. The sooner you see your doctor, the better your chances of getting treatment to slow the disease's progression.
Use this information to keep an eye out for any signs of these two diseases that can lead to vision and eye problems. Then, see your doctor, when necessary, for treatments. For more information, contact a company like Olympia Eye Clinic, Inc., P.S.
Share