Although normal-tension glaucoma (NTG) is pathogenetically heterogenous, there have been few attempts to subclassify NTG patients according to the mechanism and anatomy of optic nerve damage. This cross-sectional study was performed to investigate differences in the clinical and ocular characteristics between NTG patient groups stratified according to the degree of posterior lamina cribrosa (LC) curve which was assessed by calculating LC curvature index (LCCI). A total of 101 eyes of 101 treatment naïve NTG patients were included. The optic nerve head was imaged using enhanced-depth-imaging spectral-domain optical coherence tomography in three horizontal B-scan images in each eye. The patients were divided into two groups based on the magnitude of LCCI using a cutoff of known upper 95 percentile value in healthy subjects: a steeply curved LC group (Group 1, 75 eyes, 74.3%) and a relatively flat LC group (Group 2, 26 eyes, 25.7%). NTG eyes with relatively flat LC had lower intraocular pressure, and were associated with greater parapapillary structural alternation and systemic risk factors. These data suggest that assessment of LC morphology may help clinicians seek additional risk factors and make inferences about the mechanism of optic nerve damage in individual patients.

中文翻译：

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正常张力性青光眼的眼后和临床特征与后椎板层弯曲的程度有关。

尽管正常血压性青光眼（NTG）在病原学上是异质的，但很少有人尝试根据视神经损伤的机理和解剖将NTG患者分类。进行这项横断面研究，以调查根据根据计算LC曲率指数（LCCI）评估的后筛板（LC）曲线程度分层的NTG患者组在临床和眼部特征方面的差异。包括101例未接受过治疗的NTG患者的101眼。使用增强的深度成像光谱域光学相干断层扫描在每只眼睛的三个水平B扫描图像中对视神经乳头成像。根据LCCI的大小，使用健康受试者中已知的较高95％的临界值将患者分为两组：弯曲的LC组（第1组，75眼，74.3％）和相对平坦的LC组（第2组，26眼，25.7％）。LC相对平坦的NTG眼的眼内压较低，并与较大的乳头旁结构改变和全身性危险因素相关。这些数据表明，LC形态的评估可能有助于临床医生寻找其他危险因素，并就个别患者的视神经损伤的机制做出推断。