Fifteen-year mortality rate and visual outcome in newly diagnosed chronic open-angle glaucoma

The natural history of open-angle glaucoma has been comprehensively studied, but there is little known of the long-term mortality and visual outcome of patients with chronic open-angle glaucoma under active management.1 In a previous publication we found that 30% of a cohort of newly diagnosed glaucoma patients had died within a period of 10 years and that the survivors had good visual function.2 We reviewed the results of the same patients at 15 years and, in addition, we compared the demographic features of the group who died with those that survived. In summary, of 436 patients who were referred to a glaucoma case-finding clinic between July 1994 and December 1995, 68 patients were found to have chronic open-angle glaucoma.2 These patients were followed at regular intervals in a specialist-led glaucoma clinic. Over the next 15 years, …