Factors affecting intraocular pressure measured by noncontact tonometer

Glaucoma is one of the leading causes of blindness worldwide. When the disease is detected early and treated properly, blindness from glaucoma may be preventable. Several factors, many of which still unknown, increase the probabil ity of glaucoma development. Increased intraocular pressure (IOP) and advanced age are the well known and important risk factors for glaucoma development. Thus the screening of IOP is crucial especially in subjects above 40 years of age (1-3). Factors that may affect IOP measurements have already been studied in different nations and ethnicities (4-6). Most of these previous studies investigated the influence European Journal of Ophthalmology / Vol. 19 no. 1, 2009 / pp. 61-65