Taking care of your eyes is important for everyone, but it’s especially important if you have diabetes. Diabetes is a common health condition that affects about 10% of people around the world.
It happens when the body has trouble managing sugar (glucose), which it uses for energy. Diabetes affects many parts of the body, including the heart, kidneys, nerves, blood vessels, and the eyes.
One of the biggest eye problems linked to diabetes is called diabetic retinopathy. The retina is the part of the eye that helps you see—it senses light and sends signals to your brain. When diabetes damages the tiny blood vessels in the retina, it can lead to diabetic retinopathy.
This condition can happen to people with both type 1 and type 2 diabetes. It can also develop during pregnancy in those with gestational diabetes. If someone already has diabetes before becoming pregnant, the risk of developing diabetic retinopathy is even higher.
The tricky part about diabetic retinopathy is that it often causes no symptoms in the early stages. You might not notice anything is wrong until the condition has become more serious. Over time, the damage gets worse and can lead to vision loss. In fact, diabetic retinopathy is the leading cause of vision loss in people between the ages of 25 and 74 around the world.
Experts estimate that by the year 2030, around 191 million people will have diabetic retinopathy, and more than 56 million will have a severe form that threatens their vision.
To help catch this condition early, doctors use special software with artificial intelligence (AI) to check the eyes of people with diabetes. These systems take quick and comfortable pictures of the retina to look for signs of damage. If the software finds signs of diabetic retinopathy, the patient is referred to an eye specialist for more tests and treatment.
The best way to prevent diabetic retinopathy is by keeping your blood sugar under control. It’s also important to manage your blood pressure and cholesterol levels, as they can also affect your eyes. If you smoke, quitting can help protect your eye health.
Even if you don’t notice any problems, you should still get your eyes checked at least once a year if you have diabetes. And if you notice any of the following symptoms, you should contact your doctor right away:
blurred vision, double vision, dark spots in your vision, trouble reading, trouble seeing at night, pain in your eye, seeing flashing lights or halos, droopy eyelid, or seeing things that look too big or too small.
Also, if you suddenly start seeing spots or floaters in your vision, that could be a sign of damage.
Catching diabetic retinopathy early and getting treatment from an eye doctor can help slow down the damage or stop it from getting worse. The sooner it’s found, the better the chances of protecting your vision.
If you care about diabetes, please read studies about a cure for type 2 diabetes, and these vegetables could protect against kidney damage in diabetes.
For more health information, please see recent studies about bone drug that could lower risk of type 2 diabetes, and results showing eating more eggs linked to higher risk of type 2 diabetes.
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