Predicting Blindness in Duke’s Glaucoma Patient Population

This project involves predicting the incidence of blindness in glaucoma patients at Duke Eye Center (DEC) — specifically, the likelihood of a patient presenting legally blind (i.e. with very advanced disease) at their first visit. We will assemble a novel data set of electronic health records from thousands of DEC glaucoma patients and data from the Durham Neighborhood Compass project, a repository of geospatially resolved socioeconomic statistics on Durham county that includes features like average distance to a healthcare facility. We aim to identify risk factors associated with delayed care for glaucoma in the Durham and wider NC communities.