Book Description

The History of Glaucoma, the latest in the Hirschberg series of the history of ophthalmology, covers the twists, turns, and paradigm-shifts in the glaucoma concept over the past two millennia. Previously, scholars were not able to agree on how the term glaucoma, which related in antiquity to the color of a diseased eye, ended up describing an excavated optic neuropathy which has nothing to do with color. The volume begins in the ancient world, and proceeds all the way to the modern era of optical coherence tomography, minimally invasive surgery, and anti-VEGF agents. Ophthalmic historians and glaucoma specialists from the United States, Europe, Asia, and Latin America have contributed their scholarship and recollections to this volume, which includes photographs from private collections, information from unpublished documents, and new translations from Latin, Arabic, French, German, and Spanish. The work of masters such as Julius Hirschberg and Max Meyerhof is supplemented by the latest scholarship, which has benefited from the explosion in digitally-accessible historical documents. This new scholarship has upended many deeply rooted beliefs about ophthalmology history. Most important, the volume relates the personal stories of eye surgeons and patients, to bring the past to life. The History of Glaucoma is a must-have for anyone interested in medical history.