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Low rate of progression to visual impairment seen in UK glaucoma patients
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PRAGUE — Linear regression analysis of a large database showed a high variability in glaucoma progression rate and a low rate of progression to blindness among patients treated in U.K. glaucoma clinics.
In the United Kingdom, where more than 1 million hospital visits are performed per year for glaucoma alone, auditing of patients allowed the setup of a large data set of 25,000 patients monitored for glaucoma over a period of 12 years.
David Crabb
At the European Glaucoma Society Congress, David Crabb, MSc, PhD, statistician at the University of London, showed how these data were processed to measure the speed of visual field deterioration and to estimate how the speed of loss will affect the patient in relation to life expectancy.
“We could see that there is enormous variability in the rate of progression. Overall, 50% of the patients treated in our clinics have positive outcomes, and only 25% of eyes are significantly progressing. Projecting forward the rate of loss, patients at risk of advanced visual field impairment are 4%,” Crabb said.
Looking back at the time glaucoma was diagnosed for each of these patients with worst prognosis, a correlation was found with visual field worse than –6 dB at least in one eye.
“This is the level of VF loss we should try to avoid at the time of detecting glaucoma. To prevent this kind of visual field loss, we have to avoid late diagnosis,” Crabb said.
A positive trend toward diagnosing glaucoma at earlier stages was found by analyzing data over time.
“Half of the newly diagnosed patients now have early visual field loss in both eyes,” Crabb said. – by Michela Cimberle
Reference:
Crabb D. Learning from big data and large cohorts – big data from clinics. Presented at: European Glaucoma Society Congress; June 19-22, 2016; Prague.
Disclosure: Crabb reports no relevant financial disclosures.