Abstract
Purpose :
This is a prospective observational clinical study. The association between glaucoma and motor vehicle collisions (MVCs) has still remained unclear. In this study, the relationship between visual and systemic factors and MVCs were investigated in patients with primary open-angle glaucoma (POAG).
Methods :
Japanese POAG patients between 40 and 85 years of age were screened for eligibility. Visual field (VF) measurement was carried out using the Humphrey Field Analyser (30-2 SITA standard) in all participants, along with a series of ophthalmological examinations. Binocular VF was estimated using the integrated VF method (IVF). All of the studies patients were surveyed whether they caused any car accident as a driver in the past five years at the baseline observation. Then the participants were further prospectively surveyed whether they cause any car-traffic accident as a driver, after the baseline observation for three years; this survey was carried out every one year. Ocular and systemic factors were compared between the patients with incident MVCs (MVC+ group) and without incident MVCs (MVC– group) using the Chi square test and Man-Whitney U test. The relationship between ocular and systemic factors (gender, age, BMI, BCVA in better eye, BCVA in worse eye, mean deviation of IVF: IVF-MD, and also MVC history at baseline) and MVC was further investigated using the multiple logistic regression analysis.
Results :
Among 227 POAG patients, 191 POAG patients completed the three years observation (84.1%). Age of the 191 patients was 63.7 ± 10.2 [average ± standard deviation (S.D.)]. 141 patients were male and 50 subjects were female. Among 191 patients, 44 patients (23.0 %) had a MVC history at baseline and 28 patients (4.9 %) experienced MVC during the prospective three years’ observation. BCVA in worse eye (mean±SD: 0.026±0.04 in LogMAR) was significantly worse in MVC+ group compared with that in the MVC- group (0.013±0.04, p=0.01). Similarly, multiple logistic regression resulted in significant relationship between worse VA and MVC (coefficients: 19.6, p = 0.0034), however none of age, sex, BMI, BCVA in better eye, IVF-MD and MVC history at baseline were significantly related to MVC (p >0.05).
Conclusions :
Visual acuity in worse eye is a significant risk factor for MVCs in patients with POAG.
This is an abstract that was submitted for the 2016 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Seattle, Wash., May 1-5, 2016.