The boss of a uranium mining giant is urging people to get regular eye tests after he was recently diagnosed with a condition that would have left him blind if untreated.
Duncan Craib, the chief executive of Boss Energy, which will reopen a uranium mine at Honeymoon in South Australia in the coming months, was diagnosed with glaucoma this year.
The 49-year-old said he had never heard of the eye condition — which causes irreversible vision loss from mounting pressure within the eye — until he discovered he had it.
"I noticed around Christmas time on vacation near the ocean, the glare was beginning to affect me," Mr Craib said.
"I asked my mother-in-law, who wears bifocal glasses, and she said you've got to go get your eyes properly checked."
The earliest ophthalmologist appointment he could get was in March.
"In the lead time, I was working on the mine site and feeling quite poor, and beginning to feel under the weather really," he said.
"I didn't put it down to my eyes. I was just questioning what on earth was going on, so fortuitously I ended up in front of the ophthalmologist to have my eyes checked a few months later."
After an hour appointment, Mr Craib was told the pressure in his right eye was 58 millimeters of mercury and in his left eye 36mmHg — healthy eye pressure is 14-18mmHg.
"He suggested I get operated on pretty quickly, and eye drops could lower the pressure, so it was a real shock," Mr Craib said.
"I was told it was five minutes to midnight before I could start losing permanent sight.
"It's a frightening situation … within three months I would've been blind."
A wake-up call
Mr Craib has lost permanent peripheral vision.
"Fortunately, the eye drops have worked and lowered the pressure, I'm down to about 20 [mmHg] but I'm just managing and seeing if it can stabilise it," he said.
People aged over 40 are considered most at risk of developing glaucoma, and it is one of the leading causes of blindness for people over 60.
"I'm not yet sure if further surgery is required at this point but the main thing I've learnt from this is, please, if you're over 40, I think everyone needs to get their eyes checked at least once a year, even if you don't wear glasses," Mr Craib said.
Optimism in research
Ophthalmology professor Jamie Craig, from Flinders University's College of Medicine and Public Health, said scientists had been researching advanced glaucoma patients for about 15 years.
"We have a strong understanding that hereditary factors are a very big part of why a lot of people get these eye issues," Professor Craig said.
"We started that out to identify some of the genes that causes glaucoma … some of those discoveries were made five or 10 years ago and a particular gene could cause a high eye pressure that runs strongly in a family."
Professor Craig said researchers were developing a blood and saliva test which would rate a person's risk of developing glaucoma.
"It's not a perfect diagnostic test but what it does is highlights those people who are at very high risk," he said.
"They could be pointed in the correct direction to be monitored and treated early."
