Abstract
Purpose: :
The goal of our study was the long–term prognosis of congenital glaucoma, especially the outcome of children at school.
Methods: :
Retrospective study involving 60 patients with congenital glaucoma, during the past 20 years. We regularly followed these patients and assessed the handicap in their school apprenticeship. We notified the type of congenital glaucoma, the intraocular pressure, the visual acuity, the type of schooling : general or specialized mode.
Results: :
Some parameters appeared particularly pejorative for the school outcome : association with ocular or systemic diseases, bilateral trouble, failure of the initial procedure, secondary anatomical impairments, bad treatment of amblyopia. Except for Peters' anomaly, a normal schooling is often possible for children with congenital glaucoma. At last follow–up, 70 % of the eyes have a vision higher than 20/200, and 55 % higher than 20/50.
Conclusions: :
Affected children need a close follow–up at regular intervals . It is thus essential to develop a good doctor–to–patient contact : this improves the prognosis of this disease. Apart from the serious forms, the good outcome of congenital glaucoma is related to unilateral character of the disease, fast normalization of intraocular pressure, no other associated pathology , good treatment of amblyopia and appropriate correction of the refractive error. The more often, this leads to a normal schooling.
Keywords: clinical (human) or epidemiologic studies: outcomes/complications • infant vision • intraocular pressure