Take Your Multivitamins – and Protect Your Eyesight?

When it comes to living our most healthy lives possible, you know that eating a well-rounded diet and getting plenty of exercise are crucial to keeping your body fit and strong.  Many individuals also balance out their diets with multivitamins, which ensure that they get all the nutrition they need for optimal performance.  As it turns out, compelling new research suggests that multivitamins can do more than balance out your diet; they can actually reduce your risks of developing cataracts, especially if you’re a man.

The study – which was conducted by researchers at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston – was conducted to determine if daily use of a multivitamin could help men preserve their ocular health.  In the study, researchers compiled information from over 15,000 male doctors, all of who were over the age of 50.  The study was conducted from 1997 to 2011; during these years, approximately half of the study’s participants took multivitamins on a daily basis.  To preserve the study’s results, the multivitamins had to contain vitamin C, vitamin E, and beta carotene.  The other half of the study’s participants took placebos.

At the end of the study, researchers found that the half of participants who took multivitamins were less likely to develop cataracts (this is an eye condition that clouds the lens, causing blurred vision and even blindness, in some severe cases).  In the group that took placebos, 945 cases of cataracts were reported, as compared to 872 cases in the group that took multivitamins.  All in all, this represented a slash of nine percent.

What’s even more interesting is that the study found multivitamins could help reduce the risk of developing nuclear cataracts, which are the most common cataracts experienced during the aging process.  Daily multivitamin consumption cut this risk down by 13 percent, providing compelling evidence that a multivitamin does more than a body good – it also protects your vision.

In addition to taking multivitamins, regular appointments with your ophthalmologist can also help detect early stage cataracts before they become problematic.  Schedule your next appointment with Dr. Jacqueline Griffiths at NewView Eye Center in Reston, VA (also serving the greater Northen Virginia and Washington DC area). Just fill out the form in the top left corner or all 703-834-9777.