A recent study highlights a significant shortfall in glaucoma risk prediction models, particularly for Black patients, due to their reliance on data predominantly from European and Asian populations. Published in JAMA Ophthalmology, the study reveals that these models often fail to accurately assess glaucoma risk in individuals of African ancestry, potentially denying them timely preventative care.
Researchers analyzed data from over 78,000 patients across the United States and four African nations to evaluate the effectiveness of polygenic risk scores in predicting glaucoma risk. These tools, while effective for European populations with odds ratios reaching up to 7.24, consistently underperformed for African American and Ghanaian patients, indicating a critical gap in predictive accuracy.
