Video color perimetry: impairment in glaucoma suspects.

PURPOSE: To detect mild visual field impairment in asymptomatic glaucoma suspect patients. METHODS: Color perception within the visual field was tested with customized color video perimetry. The key features of the system were stimuli color desaturation, low-level luminance and equiluminant gray background. Twenty patients with asymptomatic glaucoma were tested and compared with a group of age-matched control subjects. RESULTS: Automated perimetry test findings differed significantly in the two groups, particularly for short-wavelength sensitivity (blue). The severity of color impairment correlated directly with intraocular pressure. CONCLUSION: Desaturated low-luminance video perimetry will reliably detect and quantify asymptomatic visual field defects. A previous work on multiple sclerosis has detected a mild long-wavelength (red) impairment in asymptomatic patients after an episode of optic neuritis, even in clinically unaffected fellow eyes. Our findings in glaucoma suspect patients indicate that a mild blue impairment could be the initial sign of this disease.

Latanoprost and the ibopamine test: a year's experience.

We report here the results obtained in a group of 52 eyes affected by open-angle Glaucoma (OAG), whose intraocular pressure (IOP) was inadequately controlled by two drugs of different pharmacological categories, into which there was introduced Latanoprost, both in place of one of the two drugs and in addition to the preceding therapy. The ocular hypotensive effect was good (21.74%). The ibopamine provocative test, carried out before the Latanoprost administration, and at 3 and 6 months into treatment gave evidence that outflow pathway compromission was uninfluenced by the drug.

Migraine and ocular pain in "glaucoma suspect".

A relationship between glaucoma and migraine has been hypothesized by some authors, but not confirmed by others. We studied the prevalence and features of migraine and ocular pain in 460 "glaucoma suspect" patients (with ocular hypertension, but without optic disc and visual field abnormalities) and 460 controls. A higher prevalence of migraine was found in patients (13%), particularly in women (17%), than in controls (7%). At the time of the interview, migraine was still active in 68% of the patients and had decreased in the remaining 32% (prevalently those not being treated for ocular hypertension), whereas it had ceased in 52% of controls. Attacks of "ocular pain" of mild and moderate intensity were found to occur in 51% of the patients with both "glaucoma suspect" and migraine, in almost all who were not taking treatment for ocular hypertension. "Ocular pain" was time-related to the history of glaucoma. Changes in intraocular pressure may play a role in the interaction between "glaucoma suspect", migraine, and ocular pain.

Normal tension glaucoma: a ten-year follow-up.

The authors describe the results obtained in 10 years of observation of a group of 41 eyes affected by normal tension glaucoma. An evolution of perimetric defects was found in 29.26% of the eyes examined.