Regular Exercise Could Help Protect Your Sight
Making sure to get regular exercise could help protect your vision, a new study suggests.
Researchers from the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health found that people who exercise three or more times a week have a 58 percent decreased odds of becoming visually impaired, compared with sedentary people, after adjusting for age. Visual impairment was defined in the study as vision loss from disease or trauma that is unable to be corrected with glasses or contact lenses.
“While age is usually one of the most strongly associated factors for many eye diseases that cause visual impairment, it is a factor we cannot change,” study researcher Dr. Ronald Klein, M.D., MPH, said in a statement. “Lifestyle behaviors like smoking, drinking and physical activity, however, can be altered. So, it’s promising, in terms of possible prevention, that these behaviors are associated with developing visual impairment over the long term.”
However, because the study only showed an association between lifestyle factors and visual impairment, it’s impossible to say that the behaviors can directly cause — or prevent — visual impairment. “Further research is needed to determine whether modifying these behaviors will in fact lead to a direct reduction in vision loss,” Klein added.