Depressive symptomatology in tertiary-care glaucoma patients

To investigate depressive symptomatology among patients with glaucoma and to relate the findings to disease stability.

Cross-sectional postal survey.

The study sample consisted of 258 patients out of a pool of 884 respondents to a survey on health and sleep sent to 1809 glaucoma patients registered in a major tertiary glaucoma centre at the Toronto Western Hospital, Toronto, Ont.

The Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale questionnaire was mailed along with questions related to demographic information, general health, and sleep quality. Respondents were included if (i) their diagnosis was either primary open-angle glaucoma, normal tension glaucoma, or primary angle-closure glaucoma; (ii) the disease duration was 3 years or more; (iii) clinical examinations were obtained annually; and (iv) perimetric results were reliable. Each patient's condition was classified as stable or progressive on the basis of pointwise decline in visual fields (VFs).

The unadjusted odds ratio for depressive symptoms was found to be 0.4 times less (95% CI 0.19-0.88) in patients with progressive VFs (n = 79) than in patients with stable VFs (n = 179). Adjusting for demographic characteristics, general health, psychiatric comorbidity, and ocular factors did not weaken this association. However, it was reduced by the increased severity of VF defects (moderate and severe).

In this sample of tertiary-care patients, depressive symptoms were found to be less common in patients with progressive than with stable VFs when defects were classified as early, but not when they were classified as moderate or severe.