The eyes don't have it

Yesterday I went to an opthalmologist to be checked for glaucoma risk. My optometrist had referred me because she didn't like the look of my optic nerves. I'm rather young to have glaucoma, but the thinking is that if things look the least bit sketchy, it's best to at least do some tests to establish a baseline from which one can track the eyes over time. So I drove up to Boulder and visited the very efficiently-run offices of an opthalmologist and two optometrists. (I imagine the office is fairly profitable, since the staff seem well-trained, handled much of the examination themselves and left the MD to evaluation and counseling roles.)

The first diagnostic tool was an ordinary intraocular pressure check using the Glowing Blue Plastic Rod Against The Eye. If it's done right you don't notice that something is touching your cornea, and it was done right. Pressures were normal, though a little on the high end of normal. You see, many kinds of glaucoma are caused by the fluid pressure inside the eye being too high, putting stress on the optic nerve and cornea.

Next was a very fancy computerized retinal tomography ("Heidelberg Retinal Tomograph") that used retinal imaging to develop a three-dimensional image of the optic nerve's attachment to the retina. Strictly speaking, according to its manufacturer, this device is a "Confocal Laser Scanning System for Quantitative Three-Dimensional Imaging of the Posterior Segment." Whatever one calls it, this is a very slick machine. It is also no doubt very expensive, since my three-minute visit with it cost my insurance carrier well over a hundred dollars. But it meant I avoided having my eyes dilated or enduring a long and tedious field-of-vision test, and it did give a very fast and detailed first impression of what's going on in the backs of my eyes.

The next part of the exam is the part that sends shivers down my spine to think of it. See, like many people, I'm very protective of my eyes, and the thought of sitting there passively while something touches the surface of my eyes just creeps the hell out of me. The next test involved a device called a "pachymeter." Its name sounds like it should be used to measure elephants. It's actually used to measure the thickness of the cornea. For this test, the medical technician numbs the eye with an anaesthetic drop and then — and this is the part that sends shivers down my spine a full day later — touches the cornea with the probe with enough pressure that the cornea bends slightly, in ways not at all like how it bends during ordinary eye focusing, and space seems to warp and wiggle. I don't have too many issues with space wiggling as long as I don't get sucked into a singularity or lose the effects of gravity, but the thought of being repeatedly touched on the cornea just gives me the creeps. Fortunately the anaesthetic worked, but after it wore off several hours later it felt just a little sore, like, well, like I'd been poked in the eyes a few hours before.

Fortunately there is nothing prompting immediate alarm, though we will have to keep track of the eyes over time. I'm considered a "glaucoma suspect." The immediate practical implication is that I will have to be poked in the eyes repeatedly. I'm glad that part happens only once per year.