Glaucoma Research Foundation

GRF Mission and History

Our Mission

To prevent vision loss from glaucoma by investing in innovative research, education, and support with the ultimate goal of finding a cure.

Founded in 1978 in San Francisco, the Glaucoma Research Foundation (GRF) was created to encourage innovative research to find better ways to care for people with glaucoma. This initiating idea has been the motivation for $45 million of grants and projects funded by GRF over the past 30 years. In addition to attracting innovative scientists, doctors and ideas to the field of glaucoma research, GRF provides education and support for those with glaucoma, their families and friends.

GRF is the nation’s largest funder of innovative glaucoma research, outside of the National Eye Institute (NEI), academia, and internally-funded corporate research.

Our donors have made possible many successful research grants, including:

• The Shaffer Fund for Innovative Glaucoma Research. Pilot research grants are awarded internationally to young scientists with promising research ideas and screened by a peer-review Scientific Advisory Committee;
• The Collaborative Normal Tension Glaucoma Study which was the first controlled clinical trial to establish that lowering eye pressure preserves vision;
• An innovative collaborative study, Catalyst For a Cure, that is redefining how glaucoma research is conducted and speeding the process of discovery to find a cure.

Glaucoma Research Foundation, a 501c3 non-profit organization, receives no government funds and is almost entirely supported through donations from private individuals.

GRF History

Today, H. Dunbar Hoskins Jr., MD is the Executive Vice President of the American Academy of Ophthalmology, and serves on the board of directors for GRF. But in San Francisco in the 1970s, he was a partner in a practice led by Robert Shaffer, MD (1912-2007), one of only a handful of ophthalmology practices in the country specializing in glaucoma. John Hetherington, MD, serving on the GRF board today, was also a partner in the practice at the time. In 1961, Shaffer had already distinguished himself as one of the leading clinicians in glaucoma when, working with Dr. Bernard Becker, he wrote the definitive text, Diagnosis and Therapy of the Glaucomas.

“We weren’t seeing enough hope for our patients back then,” remembers Dr. Hoskins. “We desperately needed better treatments. But there weren’t that many researchers interested in the field. We knew we needed some breakthroughs, and urgently. But we also knew we needed to expand the field of glaucoma research and bring more innovative thinkers. We thought this kind of entrepreneurial research would be a catalyst for others, and we could accelerate the rate of discovery.”

And so, in 1978, Drs. Shaffer, Hoskins and Hetherington founded the Glaucoma Research Foundation (GRF), today America’s oldest and most experienced national institution dedicated solely to its mission: to protect the sight and independence of people with glaucoma through research and education, and ultimately, to find the cure.

For more information

Read more about GRF’s Research Milestones
Bibliography of Research Publications