The effect of Citicoline, Vitamin C and Docosahexaenoic acid in the visual function of glaucoma patients. Updated results.

Abstract

Purpose : To evaluate the effectiveness of citicoline (Cebrolux ®), Vitamin C and docosahexaenoic acid (Brudypio ®) on the visual function of glaucoma patients.

Methods : This ongoing study is a prospective, randomized and controlled study. On December 2021, 67 patients had finalized the study. All participant persons had chronic glaucoma with structural damage as measured by OCT and visual-field damage compatible with glaucoma, mean defect (MD) between – 4 dB and -20 dB at least in one eye, a minimum of 3 reliable fields before baseline and 3 after baseline and, age between 50 and 75 years old. Persons were excluded if they were taken vitamins or nutraceutical treatments, or suffered pathologies that could alter visual fields, or had hypersensitivity to acetylsalicylic acid or fish proteins, or prior glaucoma surgery. Persons were randomly assigned receive vitamin C (VC), docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), Citicoline (C) or C + DHA. MD and Visual Field Index (VFI) slopes were calculated and a minimum positive slope-change ≥ 0,5 dB/month (MD) or ≥1.5 %/month (VFI) were considered clinically significant. Percentage of persons with positive slope-change was calculated and its association with a certain treatment was analyzed with Chi-squared test. Mann Whitney Test and T test were used to compare MD and VFI slopes, pre and post-treatment in every group.

Results : Table 1 shows mean ± sd of slopes by group:
Chi-squared test showed association with slope improvement of 0.5 dB/month in MD (p=0.003) and 1.5 %/month in VFI (p=0.02) for group 4 only. Furthermore, only group 4 showed significant improvement in MD (p=0.001) and VFI slopes (p=0.003) after 3 months of treatment.

Conclusions : C + DHA treatment improved visual field results of persons with glaucoma at short term. A larger, longer and multicenter study would be advisable to confirm these results.

This abstract was presented at the 2022 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Denver, CO, May 1-4, 2022, and virtually.