Objective: To estimate the prevalence of legal blindness among new
patients referred to the Glaucoma Service of the Malvinas Ophthalmological
Hospital, which is located in a poor area of Buenos Aires, Argentina.Materials
and Methods: 251 patients were referred to the Glaucoma Service of the Malvinas
Ophthalmological Hospital between October 1999 and August 2000. Subjects
underwent complete examination including visual acuity, biomicroscopy, fundus
examination, gonioscopy, applanation tonometry and Humphrey visual fields.
Legal blindness was defined as visual acuity of 20/200 or worse and/or visual
field constriction of 10° or less in the best eye. A brief questionnaire was
also done to evaluate if the patients were aware of the disease they had.
Results: Sixty one patients (24.30%) were legally blind in both eyes.
Diagnoses were: primary open angle glaucoma 49.18%; primary angle closure
glaucoma 19.67%, glaucoma associated with pseudoexfoliation 16.39%, neovascular
glaucoma 8.19%, and other diagnoses 6.55%. No differencies were found between
males and females. An additional 77 patients (30.67%) were already legally
blind in one eye. Eighty two percent of the patients knew that their blindness
was due to glaucoma.
Conclusion: Prevalence of legal blindness in this population of glaucoma
patients is very high. Screening and therapy for glaucoma should be tailored in
different populations.