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Cataract
What is a cataract?
When cataracts are mentioned, people often think of a film that grows on their eyes causing them to see double or blurred images. However, a cataract does not form on the eye, but rather within the eye.
A cataract is a clouding of the natural lens, the part of the eye responsible for focusing light and producing clear, sharp images. The lens is contained in a sealed bag or capsule. As old cells die they become trapped within the capsule. Over time, the cells accumulate causing the lens to cloud, making images look blurred or fuzzy. For most people, cataracts are a natural result of aging.
Eye with Cataract Eye with no Cataract
More technically speaking a cataract is an opacity that develops in the crystalline lens of the eye or in its envelope. Early on in the development of senile cataract the power of the crystaline lens may be increased, causing myopia, and the gradual yellowing and opacification of the lens may reduce the perception of blue colours. Cataracts typically progress slowly to cause vision loss and are potentially blinding if untreated.
Moreover, with time the cataract cortex liquefies to form a milky white fluid in a Morgagnian Cataract, and can cause severe inflammation if the lens capsule ruptures and leaks.
Untreated, the cataract can cause phacomorphic glaucoma. Very advanced cataracts with weak zonules are liable to dislocation anteriorly or posteriorly. Such spontaneous posterior dislocations (akin to the earliest surgical procedure of couching) in ancient times were regarded as a blessing from the heavens, because it restored some perception of light in the bilaterally affected patients.