Phacoemulsification in Glaucoma

Glaucoma is the first irreversible blindness eye disease worldwide, with a global prevalence approximately at 3.5%, affects 76 million people worldwide by 2020 [1, 2]. Intraocular pressure (IOP) still remains the only modifiable risk factor of glaucomatous optic nerve damage progression up to now. Therefore, controlling IOP is the only measure that has been proven to decrease glaucomatous optic nerve damage progression. Although not all glaucoma patients are associated with elevated IOP, it remains the only treatable risk factor and therefore the main target of current clinical therapies. Trabeculectomy and tube-shunt surgery, as two of the most common types of incisional surgery, have estimated 5-year cumulative failure rates of 47% and 30%, respectively [3]. Despite conventional glaucoma surgeries controlling IOP effectively, their high surgical failure rates have led to intense research aimed at the development of safer surgeries to control IOP, newer and more effective medications, and possible neuroprotective therapies in the last two decades.