[Follow-up examination of eyes with chronic open-angle glaucoma and optic disc hemorrhages].

Purpose: To evaluate the frequency of neuroretinal rim loss in glaucomatous eyes with ophthalmoscopically detected optic disc hemorrhages.

Methods: The prospective comparative clinical observational study included 78 eyes from 69 Caucasian patients with chronic open-angle glaucoma and a flame-shaped optic disc hemorrhage at the time of presentation, and 386 eyes from 252 patients with chronic open-angle glaucoma without disc hemorrhages. All patients underwent repeated qualitative and morphometric evaluation of color stereo optic disc photographs.

Results: Patients with disc hemorrhages were older than patients without hemorrhages and showed an initially smaller neuroretinal rim area. Of the 78 eyes with disc hemorrhages 39 showed loss of neuroretinal rim during the follow-up period. For the remaining 39 eyes, no changes of the neuroretinal rim could be detected on optic disc photographs. Of the 386 eyes without disc hemorrhages 71 showed loss of neuroretinal rim during the follow-up period. A survival analysis confirmed a hazard ratio of three between eyes with and without disc hemorrhages and a hazard ratio of 1.85 per decade of patient's age (multivariate analysis).

Conclusions: Disc hemorrhages lead to a 3-fold increase of risk for further retinal rim loss in eyes with chronic open-angle glaucoma.