Almost all glaucoma patients, including some ophthalmologists, have the perception that glaucoma is cured when high intraocular pressure is controlled within normal limits through medication or surgery. Is this really the case? Does control of IOP really mean that glaucoma is cured? The answer is no. Because glaucoma is a lifelong disease, it can only be controlled, not cured. Both a patient with suspected glaucoma and a patient with diagnosed glaucoma need to deal with their doctor for the rest of their lives and need to be reviewed regularly. In this section, we will focus on the importance of regular follow-up reviews for glaucoma patients and the key points to review. Let’s start by talking about the importance of regular follow-up reviews for glaucoma patients: The first thing you must understand as a glaucoma patient is that glaucoma is a lesion of the optic nerve and is a long-lasting group of diseases. When you are diagnosed with glaucoma, you have to be mentally prepared to fight a long war with the “enemy” of glaucoma, which may last until the last day of your life, so you must be fully prepared psychologically and physiologically, and in this war, you should always maintain a non-hurried attitude towards life and have spirit of unity and collaboration. The fact that the patient’s IOP is under control only means that the doctor and the patient have achieved a staged, partial victory in this protracted battle with glaucoma. Why do you say that? It goes back to the definition of glaucoma. Currently, all scholars at home and abroad define glaucoma as a group of diseases rather than a disease. Specifically, glaucoma is a group of diseases characterized by sunken optic nerve atrophy and visual field defects in common, with pathologically elevated intraocular pressure as its main risk factor. In other words, the onset and progression of glaucomatous optic nerve atrophy and visual field defects are related to the degree of elevated IOP and the tolerance of the optic nerve to pressure damage. The higher the IOP, the greater the damage to the optic nerve and the more severe the optic nerve atrophy and visual field defect; the more severely the optic nerve is damaged, the lower the IOP it can tolerate. We know that the optic nerve is to us what the electric wire is to the light bulb. In our daily life, there is a way to fix a broken wire. With the current level of scientific research, there is no way to connect our optic nerve when it is broken and there is no way to replace it with a new optic nerve. Therefore, for patients who have been diagnosed with glaucoma, the common task of doctors and patients is to prevent glaucoma patients from going blind, and most of all, to prevent their optic nerve from atrophying and dying, and to keep their optic nerve alive long enough as possible. Whether or not the optic nerve continues to atrophy or die is a matter of regular review and examination at the hospital. For those patients with suspected glaucoma, since glaucoma is a group of optic nerve lesions, its lesions do not occur in a day or two, it may require a longer period of follow-up; at the same time, all of our current instrumentation, although advanced, cannot give a correct diagnosis when the glaucomatous lesions have just occurred. Therefore, as a patient with suspected glaucoma, it also requires a sincere collaboration with the doctor in order to perform a longer follow-up observation to clarify whether you are a glaucoma patient or not. Second, in a general sense, glaucoma cannot be cured, but it can be controlled. Once diagnosed, it requires frequent, lifelong treatment. Actively work with your doctor to protect the optic nerve and preserve visual function with strict and regular medication or/and surgical treatment. Of course, there are a few cases of early acute closed-angle glaucoma that, with proper treatment, never flare up again and achieve a cure. In addition, some secondary glaucoma can be controlled once the causative factors are removed and the IOP drops. However, it is worth mentioning that the IOP of glaucoma patients is not constant but variable, and numerous factors can influence the fluctuation of IOP. Even when IOP is satisfactorily controlled after medication or surgery, it can fluctuate due to internal and external factors such as fatigue, mental factors, sudden changes in blood pressure and climate. Therefore, even though the IOP is normal, within a certain period of time, it should be checked in the hospital to find out the problem and deal with it in time. Early IOP may be normal after anti-glaucoma surgery, which makes some patients think that a decrease in IOP after surgery means that glaucoma is cured, but in fact some patients may still have elevated IOP despite the implementation of surgery and must be followed up regularly. Some patients with glaucoma continue to experience visual field damage even though their IOP is controlled by medication or surgery. For these patients, normal IOP may still be harmful to the optic nerve, which requires patients to be reviewed frequently so that doctors can accurately grasp their “individual target IOP” and adjust their treatment plan in a timely manner to preserve residual visual function. When a patient’s IOP is controlled by medication or surgery, we, as doctors and patients, want the IOP to be controlled for a longer period of time, so that this milestone victory can be maintained for as long as possible, preferably forever. In addition, for those patients with suspected glaucoma, regular follow-up reviews are even more important. Because IOP fluctuates, there are fluctuations throughout the day, and it may be different at different times of the month or year. Just because a patient’s IOP is normal at a particular examination does not mean that it is always normal. Therefore, a normal IOP at one time does not mean that the patient is glaucoma-free, let alone that the patient’s glaucoma is permanently controlled, whether the patient is a suspected glaucoma patient or a confirmed glaucoma patient. As doctors and patients alike, it is important to understand the importance and necessity of follow-up reviews.