Some clinical implications of the collaborative normal tension glaucoma study

This is to present the results of randomized multicenter normal tension glaucoma study. The primary aim of the study was to establish whether a 30% or greater pressure reduction altered the course of NTG compared to untreated controls. Our study confirms that in glaucoma patients even with normal intraocular pressures the pressure is involved in its pathogenesis and that pressure reduction favourably affects its course in a significant proportion of cases. Moreover, it identifies a great variability of the untreated disease. Over 7 years nearly half appeared to show no progression, the other half showed progression of their damaged area but this was slow and often did not result in a change of their MD index. There was a small group, who showed rapidly advancing disease, which was likely lead to visual handicap. Moreover, it was then attempted to study risk factors, other than intraocular pressure. Gender, ethnic background, migraine and the presence of disc hemorrhage adversely influence the course of the disease and may therefore account for some of the variability in the course of the disease. normal tension glaucoma, randomized multicenter study.