Association of Anxiety and Depression with Glaucoma

Glaucoma is a heterogeneous group of conditions involving cupping and atrophy of the optic nerve, characteristic visual field loss and often but not invariably a high intraocular pressure.1 It is estimated that over 60 million people worldwide currently suffer from glaucoma, of whom 4.5 million are estimated to become legally blind2 . Glaucoma is the third largest cause of blindness worldwide after cataract and trachoma. In India more that 90% of glaucoma remain undiagnosed then also studies reported that one in eight persons above the age of 40 years in India is either suffering from glaucoma or is at risk of the disease accounting for glaucoma prevalence in India between 2 to 13 %. 3 The role of emotional factors in glaucoma is also important and has received wide recognition by investigators and clinicians from the very beginning.4 So glaucoma is also considered to be a psychosomatic disorder. Physical illnesses also create psychological squeal that precipitate psychiatric disorders severe enough to require specialist treatment.5 Depression and anxiety constitute greater percentage of these common co-morbid psychiatric disorders in glaucoma patients.6 . Additionally it is also reported that the presence of these symptoms in patients leads to poor glaucoma medication use.7 So for proper treatment of glaucoma and these psychiatric co-morbidity that develop with glaucoma, it is also important to identify associating factors of these psychiatric co-morbidity with glaucoma.