Healthy lifestyles translate to lower risk of retinal disease
Researchers screened for outcomes such as the presence of retinal diseases including age-related macular degeneration and retinal vein occlusion
(Image credit: pexels.com/Andrea Piacquadio)
A collaboration between Chinese and Australian researchers found that individuals’ adherence to a healthy lifestyle resulted in lower levels of inflammation, which positively impacted the retinal neurovascular health.1
The study, published in the British Journal of Ophthalmology, was led by Xiaomin Zeng, a medical student from the Guangdong Eye Institute, Department of Ophthalmology, Guangdong Provincial People’s Hospital, Guangdong Academy of Medical Sciences, Southern Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China.
Ms Zeng and her associates used data from the UK Biobank to investigate the associations between a healthy lifestyle score and retinal neurovascular health. The investigators intended to determine if lower inflammation levels mediate the associations between lifestyle and retinal health.
The healthy lifestyle scores ranged from 0 to 6, with scores of 5 and 6 indicating better healthy life score. The elements included in the score were physical activity, diet, sleep duration, smoking status, alcohol consumption, and bodyweight.
The primary outcomes included the presence of retinal diseases such as age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and retinal vein occlusion (RVO) in 378,648 participants; retinal vascular metrics from retinal photographs of 32,226 participants; and retinal neural metrics from optical coherence tomography images from 42,557 participants. An INFLA-score, a new diagnostic paradigm, was used to characterise inflammation levels.
Analysis of inflammation
Ms Zeng and colleagues reported the following positive effects of lower bodily levels of inflammation. “Participants with better healthy life scores (scored from 5 to 6) were associated with a 29% lower risk of AMD, a 25% lower risk of RVO, a 2% increase in the artery-to-vein ratio (AVR), a 0.22 -µm increase in the central retinal artery equivalent, a 0.36- µm decrease in the central retinal vein equivalent (CRVE), a 0.004 increase in the fractal dimension, a 0.38 -µm increase in the retinal nerve fiber layer, a 0.69 - µm increase in the ganglion cell-inner plexiform layer (GCIPL), and a 0.35 -µm increase in the photoreceptor segment (PS) compared with participants with worst lifestyle score (scored from 0 to 1) (all ptrend<0.01),” they said.
They also pointed out that the INFLA-score partially mediated the associations between healthy lifestyle score and the participants’ increased risk of AMD (mediated proportion [MP]: 14.8%), higher AVR (MP: 12.76%), narrower CRVE (MP: 24.49%), thicker GCIPL (MP: 4.97%) and thicker PS (MP: 26.86%).
The study concluded that “…adherence to a healthier lifestyle was associated with better retinal health in a dose-response manner. Lower inflammation partially mediated the association between a healthy lifestyle score and retinal health.”
