Illness Perception in Glaucoma
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Illness Perception in Glaucoma (IPIG) Study
IRAS ID
140349
Contact name
David Crabb
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
City University London
Research summary
This study has two objectives:
First, the negative impact of receiving a diagnosis of glaucoma or ocular hypertension (OHT) on the patient and the effect on their quality of Life may be considerably underestimated; this is important because the outlook in most of these patients is not particularly severe, with most patients not reaching a significant level of visual disability within their lifetime (Ang & Eke, Eye, 2007, reported 6.6% partial sight registration and 0% blind). This has implications about how a diagnosis of glaucoma is communicated in a clinical setting.
Second, the health economic values placed on chronic conditions are inherently linked to its illness perception. We aim to show that this illness perception is ‘dynamic’ in glaucoma. Sometimes people without the disease, rather than patients, are asked to determine the value of different health states. Those without the disease predict that life would be worse with a health state than patients actually report. We are motivated to see if patient’s perception of their health state varies with time since diagnosis of their chronic condition.
There exists an impressive body of literature on how people perceive illness, including some work with glaucoma patients; this has led to the development of convenient and validated questionnaires for measuring it. There also exists a variety of patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) that are accepted widely as important outcomes in comparative effectiveness research in chronic disease. Questionnaires such as the EuroQol 5D (EQ-5D) are able to quickly estimate wellbeing. Using a selected combination of measurement tools, including those that classify personality states, allied with a careful assessment of patient’s visual function, we will investigate these two objectives.
REC name
North West - Liverpool Central Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
14/NW/0324
Date of REC Opinion
14 May 2014
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion