Raised eye pressure

[Cruz1950]

Can squeezing your eyelids tightly shut raise eye pressure? (I have a bad habit of closing them tightly shut) If so can raised eye pressure from squeezing eyelids tightly shut effect the pigments in the iris resulting in hyperpigmentation? , basically does raised eye pressure effect the color of the iris?

[John C Hagan III, MD, FACS, FAAO]

Squeezing the eye tighly can cause increase of intraocular pressure (IOP) however since it is done for only short periods of time it isn't considered likely to cause damage. More worrisome is rubbing the eye hard with finger or knuckles. that can raise IOP and has been implicated in a cornea disease called keratoconus.   Rubbing the eye will not cause loss of pigment from irus, a hard blow can.  There is a type of glaucoma called pigmentary glaucoma in which because of the structure of the eye pigment falls out of the iris and plugs the drainage pores.

[Cruz1950]

So raised eye pressure has no effect on iris color?

[John C Hagan III, MD, FACS, FAAO]

You asked about squeezing your eyes tight.   Extremely high IOP such as attack of angle closure glaucoma where IOP can go over 50 can cause atrophy of pigment in iris and thus color.