Study ‘adds nuance’
Commenting on the study, Ipsit V. Vahia, MD, of the department of psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, Boston, and associate chief of geriatric psychiatry at McLean Hospital, Belmont, Mass., said the study “adds nuance to our understanding” of the well-established relationship between vision deficits and depression.
“It indicates that even mild visual deficits may be associated with depression,” said Dr. Vahia, who was not involved with the research.
The investigators validated this association by showing that visual acuity was also associated with neuroimaging markers of depression, he added.
Although the study was not designed to demonstrate causal relationships between mood and vision and its findings do not confirm that correcting visual acuity deficits will resolve depressive symptoms, “the large study sample and high quality of data should give clinicians confidence in the study’s findings,” Dr. Vahia said.
“Correcting visual acuity deficits can be considered standard care for older adults worldwide, and this study suggests that providing this standard care could also benefit mental health,” he concluded.
The study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation, the Outstanding Young Talent Trainee Program of Guangdong Provincial People’s Hospital, the Guangdong Provincial People’s Hospital Scientific Research Funds for Leading Medical Talents and Distinguished Young Scholars in Guangdong Province, the Talent Introduction Fund of Guangdong Provincial People’s Hospital, the Science and Technology Program of Guangzhou, China, the Project of Special Research on Cardiovascular Diseases, the Research Foundation of Medical Science and Technology of Guangdong Province, the University of Melbourne at Research Accelerator Program, and the CERA (Centre for Eye Research Australia) Foundation and Victorian State Government for the Centre for Eye Research Australia. The investigators and Dr. Vahia have reported no relevant financial relationships.
A version of this article first appeared on Medscape.com.