A meta-analysis of existing health and nutrition data on 3,406 US women aged 40 and above, collected from 2005 to 2008, showed that women who had taken oral contraceptives for longer than three years were 2.05 times more likely to report a diagnosis of glaucoma.
The collaborative study involved a number of institutions, including the University of California and Duke University in the US, and Nanchang University in China.
Dr. Shan Lin, lead researcher based at the University of California, San Francisco, said women taking oral contraception for three or more years “should be screened for glaucoma … especially if they have any other risk factors”.
However experts are keen to point out that the findings have not been through the rigorous scientific peer review process, and are yet to be published.
A consultant for the Glaucoma Team at Moorfields Eye Hospital, Richard Wormald, warned that the announcement had the potential to “cause a lot of alarm”, adding “there’s actually no plausible, patho-physiological mechanism whereby oral contraceptives would cause glaucoma”.
