Glaucoma is the leading cause of irreversible blindness in China, as elsewhere in the world. In Chinese rural settings, where topical glaucoma medication is unlikely to be a practical and sustainable option, surgery is the primary treatment modality for glaucoma.
However, it is known that vision is quite likely to decline in the short to medium term after glaucoma surgery, and there are concerns that dis-satisfaction resulting from such vision changes might lead to negative social marketing, affecting uptake not only of glaucoma surgical care but other eye operations (principally cataract) as well. We propose to test the impact on post-operative satisfaction of a multi-media educational intervention designed to give patients a realistic expectation of their post operative course: glaucoma surgery is being performed NOT to improve vision, but do protect it from future harm, and vision may in fact decline for several weeks post operatively.
A randomized controlled design will be used, and subjects undergoing glaucoma surgery will be enrolled at 4 rural county hospitals in rural Guangdong province, and randomized to receive the intervention or usual care. The principal outcome will be subjective satisfaction on a previously-tested questionnaire instrument, administered pre-operatively and post-operatively on two occasions in the first month following surgery. Patients not returning post-operatively to the surgical facility will be contacted by telephone for administration of the questionnaire. Other facility- and patient-related clinical and personal factors expected to influence satisfaction will also be recorded, and adjusted for in all analyses.
