Older women who undergo cataract surgery are at 60 percent reduced risk of death from all causes, suggests a recent study. The findings indicated that cataract surgery was associated with a 60 percent reduced risk of death from all causes and a 37 to 69 percent reduced risk of death due to pulmonary, accidental, infectious, neurologic and vascular diseases and cancer.
The study was conducted on a total of 74,044 women with cataracts, including 41,735, who underwent cataract surgery and the average age was 71 years.
Anne L Coleman from the University of California, Los Angeles, and her colleagues from the Women’s Health Initiative (WHI) conducted the research .
Previous studies have suggested an association between cataract surgery and decreased risk from all causes of mortality potentially through a mechanism of improved health status and functional independence.
“Further study of the interplay of cataract surgery, systemic disease and disease-related mortality would be informative for improved patient care,” the authors concluded.
The research appeared in the journal of JAMA Ophthalmology.
