Glaucoma is one of the world’s leading causes of permanent blindness.
The disease slowly damages the optic nerve, which carries visual information from the eye to the brain.
Many people do not notice symptoms until vision has already been lost, making early diagnosis and treatment very important.
Current treatments usually focus on lowering pressure inside the eye with eye drops, laser treatment, or surgery, but these methods do not work equally well for everyone.
A new study from Karolinska Institutet offers hope for a different way to slow the disease. The research, published in Cell Reports Medicine, suggests that a combination of common vitamins may help protect the retina and optic nerve, even without lowering eye pressure.
The encouraging findings have already led to a clinical trial in Sweden to test whether the treatment can benefit people with glaucoma.
The researchers investigated a substance called homocysteine, which is involved in normal body metabolism. Earlier studies had suggested that high homocysteine levels might contribute to glaucoma.
However, after studying animals with glaucoma and people living with the disease, the scientists found that higher homocysteine levels did not make glaucoma worse or predict faster vision loss.
This finding suggested that homocysteine itself is probably not causing the disease. Instead, it appears to be a sign that important metabolic processes inside the retina are no longer working properly. The retina is the light-sensitive layer at the back of the eye that converts light into signals for the brain. When its metabolism slows down, retinal cells become more vulnerable to damage.
The research team believed that this metabolic slowdown might be linked to reduced activity of vitamins that are needed for healthy cell function.
To test this idea, they gave laboratory mice and rats with glaucoma a combination of vitamin B6, vitamin B9, also known as folate, vitamin B12, and choline. These nutrients all play important roles in helping cells produce energy and carry out normal chemical reactions.
The results were impressive. In mice with slowly developing glaucoma, damage to the optic nerve stopped completely. In rats with a more aggressive form of the disease, the vitamins greatly slowed its progression. Importantly, these benefits occurred without reducing pressure inside the eye, showing that the treatment worked through a completely different pathway.
Dr. James Tribble, assistant professor at Karolinska Institutet and co-lead author of the study, said the team believes altered homocysteine levels reflect a loss of vitamin-dependent metabolism in the retina. Restoring these nutrients appeared to improve the health of retinal tissue and make it more resistant to damage.
Because the laboratory results were so encouraging, researchers have started a clinical trial at St Eriks Eye Hospital in Stockholm.
The study is enrolling people with primary open-angle glaucoma, the most common form of the disease, as well as pseudoexfoliation glaucoma, which usually progresses more quickly. The trial will determine whether the same benefits seen in animals also occur in patients.
If future studies confirm these findings, vitamin supplements could become an important addition to current glaucoma treatment.
Rather than replacing eye drops or surgery, they may help protect the retina and optic nerve alongside existing therapies. This research also highlights the growing importance of metabolism and nutrition in protecting the eyes and may lead to new ways of preventing vision loss in the future.
If you care about eye health, please read studies about how vitamin B may help fight vision loss, and MIND diet may reduce risk of vision loss disease.
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