Plasmatic neuroglobin during the primitive open-angle glaucoma.

OBJECTIVE: Elucidate the relation between neuroglobin and the primitive open-angle glaucoma. PATIENTS AND METHODS: This cross-sectional case-control study involved 64 patients with primitive open-angle glaucoma on 2 eyes and 64 control subjects. Glaucoma was classified as early, moderate or severe according to ophthalmological examination. Then we determined neuroglobin concentration and compared his ROC curve with characteristics of glaucoma. Chi-square test was used to compare proportions and spearman test for correlations between quantitative variables. RESULTS: Neuroglobin concentrations were higher among patients with glaucoma compared to control's (4.7±4.6 ng/mL versus 0.9±1.1 ng/mL, p=0.0000). Neuroglobin concentration was related to visual acuity, to the cup/disc ratio (eye right: r=0.340, p=0.006 and left eye: r=0.413, p=0.001). In addition, neuroglobin concentration was correlated with duration (r=0.565; p=0.000) and glaucoma severity (r=0.506, p=0.000). The area under the curve of neuroglobin concentration was 0.82 compared to that of intra ocular pressure (0.70). CONCLUSION: This study suggests that neuroglobin could be used as biomarker for glaucoma diagnosis.