A CLINICAL STUDY ON STRUCTURAL AND FUNCTIONAL DEFECTS CORRELATION IN THE DIAGNOSIS OF GLAUCOMA.

Dr. Santana Sarmah; Dr. Mausumi Das

Volume : X, Issue : VII, July - 2020

A CLINICAL STUDY ON STRUCTURAL AND FUNCTIONAL DEFECTS CORRELATION IN THE DIAGNOSIS OF GLAUCOMA.

Dr. Santana Sarmah, Dr. Mausumi Das

Abstract :

Background: Evaluation of Optic Nerve and Retinal Nerve Fiber Layer (RNFL) includes examination of structure and functions. Glaucomatous retinal ganglion cell loss results structurally in RNFL and Optic Nerve Head (ONH) defects; and functionally in visual field changes. AIM : to study the Optic Nerve defects in correlation with RNFL thickness and visual field defect in Primary Open Angle Glaucoma(POAG). Material and Methods : A total of “70” diagnosed cases of POAG were included in this study which was conducted for a period of one year. All the patients were thoroughly worked up including history, comprehensive ocular & systemic examination ,ONH examination with + 90D , imaging of RNFL, ONH and macula with posterior segment OCT. Results: Our study observed that POAG was more common in fifth decade of life, the mean age being 54.88±9.39 years. Incidence of POAG was more in males(68.5%) as compared to female(31.42%).In this study maximum number of eyes had vertical cup–disc ration as 0.6:1. Maximum RNFL thickness was found to be 100.4µm while the minimum was 37µm. The average RNFL thickness was calculated as 73.61± 16.327µm. This observation was statistically extremely significant (P< 0.0001). study showed a decrease in average RNFL thickness with decrease in vision. There was a statistically significant correlation with each other (P=0.0036). However this study suggested that, there was a statistically significant correlation between visual field defect of right (r=0.3844,P=0.0004) and left eye(r=0.5036,P=0.001) with RNFL of right eye and left eye. Conclusion: POAG is a chronic progressive irreversible blinding disease in which optic nerve damage correlates with reduction of RNFL thickness. These changes again showed significant correlation between visual field defect and reduction of macular thickness.