Abstract
Purpose :
There is growing interest in the relationship between age-related vision loss and cognitive function. Our objective was to determine if two groups with age-related eye disease have worse cognitive function than a group with normal vision using cognitive tests that do not rely on vision.
Methods :
We are conducting a cross-sectional hospital-based study of older adults (n=236) having either age-related macular degeneration (AMD) (n=65), glaucoma (n=65), or a control group with normal vision (n=106) in Montreal, Canada. Those in the AMD group were diagnosed with late stage AMD in both eyes with a better eye visual acuity of 20/40 or worse. Those in the glaucoma group had primary open-angle glaucoma in both eyes with a visual field mean deviation worse or equal to -4dB in their better eye. Controls had no diagnosis of AMD or glaucoma, a visual acuity better than 20/30 in both eyes and a visual field mean deviation better than -3dB in both eyes. Additional inclusion criteria were age of 65 years or older and a score of 10 or more on the Mini-Mental State Examination Blind Version. Cognition was measured with six cognitive tests administered orally including the Verbal Fluency Test animal and letter versions, the Verbal Digit Span forward and backward versions, and the 18-item story with immediate and delayed recall. Linear regression was used for analyzing data.
Results :
Both AMD and glaucoma are associated with worse scores on all 6 cognitive outcomes before adjustment (Verbal Fluency Test animal and letter scores, Verbal Digit Span forward and backward scores, 18-item story immediate and delayed recall scores). However, after adjustment for age, sex, education, diabetes, and cataract, there is 1 statistically significant association. Glaucoma is associated with a lower 18-item immediate recall story score (β=-1.40, 95% Confidence Interval (CI) -2.73, -0.07). There is a borderline statistically significant association between AMD and worse letter verbal fluency (β=-1.81, 95% Confidence Interval (CI) -3.65, 0.03).
Conclusions :
There is some evidence that age-related eye disease, as defined using our inclusion criteria, is related to cognitive function. Longitudinal follow-up, as is planned in this study, will inform us as to whether age-related eye disease is associated with greater cognitive changes over time.
This is an abstract that was submitted for the 2018 ARVO Annual Meeting, held in Honolulu, Hawaii, April 29 - May 3, 2018.