Year: 2010
Type: editorial
Abstract: W e have come to the end of the first decade of the third millennium.And this issue of Acta Ophthalmologica contains mainly contributions dealing with glaucoma directly or indirectly.It is interesting to look at these contributions and reflect for a moment on glaucoma research.Are we making real progress or are we not?Should we do things differently?Glaucoma used to be identical to elevated IOP.This of course is not true true any more.Yet, glaucoma has a lot do do with IOP.IOP is what we treat and it is the centre of interest for us a lot of the time, and also in many (or perhaps most?) papers about glaucoma.A review paper in this issue by Peeters and co-workers emphasizes the large effects of IOP reduction.The authors performed a meta-analysis of papers on studies of patients in ocular hypertension and found that the risk of conversion to glaucoma decreased by 14% for every mm Hg of IOP reduction.They could not perform a meta-analysis of OAG patients, because they found only one study.This, of course, is new and solid knowledge.Peeters' meta-analysis paper on the effects of IOP reduction on glaucoma progression pin-points one of the areas where the most important firm knowledge has occurred in the last decade.We now all know the very large effects of IOP lowering, and that pressure lowering is of benefit in progressing glaucoma eyes also if IOP levels are normal.It would now be useful and interesting to find out if the effect of IOP lowering increases
Source: Acta Ophthalmologica
Author: Anders Heijl
Language: English
Subfield: Ophthalmology
Field: Medicine
Domain: Health Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2026227004