What does obsesity have to do with the eye?

Is obesity directly related to the eyes? Ophthalmologist Rita Laiginhas explains that it does:

Obesity is a disease which affects all the organs of the human body and which, in the long term, is associated with major risks such as the development of cardiovascular diseases or even dementia. And where does the eye come in here? The eye can be seen as a window for us to see the small vessels and neurons of the human body and we used these properties in a clinical study that, by doing a simple examination that does not involve any type of risk for the patient, we were able to detect early signs of alteration of the small vessels and the structure of the eye in patients with obesity, at a stage when these people still had no symptoms. This is important; and it is important to detect these early signs of disease in obesity because it can help us to flag up patients at higher risk of developing complications and intervene in time to prevent this trend.

Tomorrow we will understand how the blood vessels of the retina reflect the state of the cardiovascular system.

With the support of the Portuguese Society of Ophthalmology.