Clinical and Ocular Histopathological Findings in a Patient With Normal-Pressure Glaucoma

Open Access
Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
GLAUCOMATOUS optic neuropathy is characterized by loss of retinal ganglion cells and their axons, excavated appearance of optic nerve head, and progressive loss of visual field sensitivity. Although clinical studies have shown the role of several risk factors in glaucomatous optic neuropathy, including high intraocular pressure (IOP),1,2 about 20% to 25% of glaucomatous optic neuropathy develops in patients with normal IOP.3 Despite several histopathological reports of postmortem human eyes from patients with primary open-angle glaucoma,4-7 and despite experimental studies using glaucoma models in which IOP is elevated,8,9 it is not clear whether the pathological findings of glaucomatous eyes with normal IOP are similar to those seen in glaucomatous eyes with high IOP. We herein present the clinical and postmortem histopathological findings in a patient with normal-pressure glaucoma, including evidence of immunoglobulin deposition in the retina and apoptotic retinal cell death using terminal deoxynucleotidyltransferase-mediated deoxyuridine triphosphate nick-end labeling (TUNEL) technique.10