On the Relationship Between Simple Glaucoma and General Cardio‐vascular Diseases

Abstract

Wessely (1908) showed in animal experiments a parallelism between the general blood pressure and the eye pressure. Subsequent authors have discussed the relation between cardio-vascular diseases, among them arterial hypertension and glaucoma.Kraemer (1910) found no definite blood pressure difference in 45 patients suffering from glaucoma and 90 patients suffering from cataract.Kummel (1911, 1914) found, on the other hand, considerably higher blood pressure in 70 patients with glaucoma than in a control material of 90 patients. Only a small part of these glaucoma patients suffered from simple glaucoma. He found a lower average blood pressure in cases of simple glaucoma than in cases of other types of the disease, in spite of the fact that the former had a considerably higher average age. Gilbert (1912) compared blood pressure values of 20 patients suffering from simple glaucoma and 19 with glaucoma inflammatorium. Like Kummel he also found the lower blood pressure in the patients suffering from simple glaucoma, though they had the higher average age. Among the 20 patients with simple glaucoma only two were under 60 years of age.Craggs & Taylor (1913) and Mac Rae (1915) found no relation between general arterial hypertention and glaucoma.Elschnig (1917) compared the blood pressure in 162 glau-*) Received April lst, 1951.

Some Factors Affecting the Distribution of Intraocular Pressures in a Population

“…There seems to be no significant sex difference (Hollows & Graham 1966). The general opinion is that a high blood pressure is prognostically favourable with regard to the visual field defects (Frangois & Neetens 1970) and systemic hypertension is not found more frequently in patients with glaucoma than in controls of the same age and sex (Sunde 1951).…”

Hypertension in Primary Open Angle Glaucoma

“…[1][2][3] Some authors have described association of glaucoma with low systolic blood pressure, 4 some, low blood pressure in normal tension glaucoma and high blood pressure in POAG, [5][6][7] and others have reported no difference in blood pressure in glaucoma and control. 8,9 A reduced ocular perfusion pressure in POAG patients compared with normal controls was reported in a number of studies. 10,11 A low perfusion pressure impairs the perfusion of the optic nerve and causes glaucomatous loss of the visual field.…”