Deep research and expert guides on maintaining your visual health.
Dry Eye & Glaucoma: Fix the Surface, Fix the Tests Persistent dryness and irritation of the eye surface—often called dry eye disease or ocular surface disease—is very common in people with glaucoma (especially those using eye drops). This surface problem can blur vision, make you blink more, and change the way your eyes see light. That in turn can throw off glaucoma tests. For example, a frustrate...
OCT artifacts are errors or misleading features that appear in optical coherence tomography images and do not represent real structures in the eye. Optical coherence tomography is a scanning technique that builds detailed cross-sectional images of the retina and optic nerve, and artifacts can make those images look distorted or incomplete. Common causes include eye movement, blinking, poor focus, dry surface, eyelid shadow, floaters, and software mistakes such as incorrect layer labeling. Artifacts can also come from hardware problems, low signal strength, or patient factors like small pupils or cataracts. These errors matter because clinicians rely on OCT images to diagnose diseases, measure tissue thickness, and decide how a condition is progressing. If an artifact is mistaken for real disease, it can lead to wrong diagnoses or unnecessary treatment; if disease is hidden by an artifact, problems can be missed. Technicians and doctors reduce artifacts by ensuring proper alignment, using appropriate scan settings, asking patients to blink or rest between scans, and repeating scans when needed. Modern software also flags suspicious scans and offers tools to correct or re-segment layers, but human review remains critical to spot subtle issues. Knowing about artifacts helps patients understand why scans might be repeated and why clinicians look at images alongside symptoms and other tests.
