Christie Brinkley just told her fans that she is “very grateful” to her “brilliant ophthalmologist” who discovered that she had a rare type of glaucoma that she needed surgery to treat. According to the 67-year-old former Sports Illustrated model, had she not gone in for a routine eye exam and the glaucoma was undiscovered and therefore untreated, she could have gone blind!
“I just discovered that I have something called Acute Angle Closure,” Brinkley wrote on Instagram on December 15th, alongside a picture of herself receiving an eye examination. “I only found out because I included an eye exam as part of my yearly physical check up and my brilliant ophthalmologist spotted this problem.”
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“They can fix it by brace yourselves, drilling a hole thru your eye! It’s not as gruesome as it sounds,” she continued. “In fact I just had it done in this photo, piece of cake. But if left untreated it could have resulted in vision loss…So I’m very grateful!” Brinkley concluded her post by thanking her ophthalmologist and encouraging others to get their eyes checked routinely: “Thank you Dr Coles! And friends keep your eye on your precious eyes!” She ended the post with some eye emojis, and added, “Get them checked!”
Her friends and fans sent their well-wishes on Instagram, while also thanking her for being so honest about her health scare. “Soooo scary , glad your ok,” one IG user wrote, while another said, “glad you went for that checkup.” “So glad they detected that,” wrote another, before adding, “annual eye exams are important as are good doctors.” Another user said, “Wow Christie you were lucky to have been checked at this time AND to not need a more invasive surgical procedure !!!! TOP NOTCH CARE THERE. Take such good care…. You know ….things we never really think about, when we have an issue , Makes us ever so more grateful for our health and well being . EYE am so very glad you are OK,” to which Brinkley replied, “Yes I’m lucky and I shudder to think what could have happened if I hadn’t made the time! I want everyone to know how important it is do add this to your annual check up !”
