Congenital glaucoma may be associated, secondary or primary. Primary congenital glaucoma is due to the persistence in the anterior chamber angle of embryonic mesodermal tissue. Its inheritance is autosomal-recessive, sex-controlled and variable in penetrance. The treatment is surgical, goniotomy being as good as trabeculotomy.

Topical instillations or parabulbar injections of corticosteroids produce an increase of insoluble polymerized acid mucopolysaccharides. These glycosaminoglycans close the intratrabecular meshes by increasing the thickness of the trabeculae. Perfusion with hyaluronidase, which depolymerizes the mucopolysaccharides, diminishes the diameter of the trabeculae, the more so that after the suppression of the corticosteroid treatment the lysosomal membranes become more permeable for the acid hydrolases.

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Isolated cases of cataract are often hereditary. This is the case in at least 25% of congenital cataracts and in a great number of acquired cataracts. They are mostly autosomal dominant. The cataracts associated with metabolic disorders or genetic dysplasias of course display the same inheritance mode as the systemic disease.

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