Heritability of Ocular Pressure

The heritability of ocular pressure in the normal and suspect ranges was studied in 355 individuals consisting of 133 nuclear family groups. The mean pressure between right and left eyes ranged from 10 to 30. There was no definite glaucoma or history of glaucoma in these patients. Heritability is a measure of genetic resemblance between relatives and was defined as the ratio of the additive genetic variance to the observed phenotypic variance. It was calculated from the linear regression and correlation coefficients between first degree relatives. The heritability was significant with an estimated value between 0.40 and 0.50 and a standard error of 0.10.