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Betsy Sleath, Ph.D., a pharmacy professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has received a grant worth $2.65 million over four years from the National Eye Institute to study how communication between glaucoma patients and doctors affects how patients take their medication and the effectiveness of the treatment.

Betsy Sleath, Ph.D., a pharmacy professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, has received a grant worth $2.65 million over four years from the National Eye Institute to study how communication between glaucoma patients and doctors affects how patients take their medication and the effectiveness of the treatment.

There is no cure for glaucoma, but the disease can be treated with medication or surgery to prevent further loss of vision. However, about half the patients who start on glaucoma medications stop taking them within six months, even though they should take the medications for the rest of their lives. Glaucoma affects more than 2 million Americans and is responsible for approximately 10 percent of all cases of blindness in the United States.

A pilot study conducted by Sleath and Alan Robin, M.D., of Johns Hopkins University, found that 15 percent of the patients said no one gave them information about their glaucoma medications, and 20 percent said no one showed them how to use their medications.

Sleath is a professor in the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy and a research fellow at the Cecil G. Sheps Center for Health Services Research. One of her specialties is studying how the quality of communication between patients and physicians affects health. Susan Blalock, Ph.D., who is also an associate professor at the school, is a major collaborator on the grant.

Along with Sleath and Blalock, the study includes researchers from the UNC School of Medicine, the UNC Gillings School of Global Public Health; Emory Duke and Johns Hopkins universities, and ophthalmology practices around the state.

For more information, go to: http://www.pharmacy.unc.edu/news/schoolnews/sleath-receives-2-65-million-grant-to-study-glaucoma-patients

Eshelman School of Pharmacy contact: David Etchison, (919) 966-7744, david_etchison@unc.edu

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