EXFOLIATION SYNDROME:
THE FIRST POTENTIALLY CURABLE GLAUCOMA
The Foundation’s 2009 Annual Optic Nerve Rescue and Restoration Think Tank will focus on exfoliation syndrome (XFS), an age-related systemic disease characterized by the production and progressive accumulation of a whitish material in many ocular tissues. Worldwide, it is the most common identifiable cause of open-angle glaucoma. It is a cause of open-angle glaucoma, angle-closure glaucoma, and cataract.
According to Dr. Robert Ritch, TGF’s Medical Director and Chairman of the Scientific Advisory Board, “This year’s Think Tank will attempt to relate the current status of our knowledge about XFS in order to develop new approaches to prevention of the formation or reversal of the deposition of exfoliation material and to explain the origin of its various systemic manifestations.”
About 25 percent of persons with XFS develop elevated IOP and one-third of these develop glaucoma. However, if you have XFS syndrome, your chances of developing glaucoma are about six times higher than if you don’t. An increasing list of associations with cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases makes XFS a condition of general medical importance. Recently described associations include stroke, cardiovascular dysfunction, Alzheimer’s disease and hearing loss.
The discovery in 2007 of genetic abnormalities in the lysyl oxidase gene, which is responsible for the formation and maintenance of elastic tissue, is expected to make a major impact not only in understanding XFS but in leading to new avenues of therapy.
The interdisciplinary Think Tank is now in its 16th year. It brings together clinician-researchers in glaucoma, researchers in other areas of the eye, and individuals from other disciplines totally uninvolved with the eye to cross-fertilize ideas and identify important areas for future research and funding. Some 50 participants from the US and abroad will attend the Think Tank in New York City on October 2nd and 3rd.