Cats may increase risk of Glaucoma

A headline caught my attention this week ‘Cats may increase risk of Glaucoma’.

The article about a rather unusual American study could bring alarm to the millions of cat owners in the UK so let me try and ease your mind before you lock your cat out for good.

The article states that American researchers found that being exposed to particular animals such as cats and cockroaches (hopefully you don’t have any of those as pets) may increase a person’s risk of developing glaucoma.

However, contact with dogs could guard against the eye disease, the same study found.

Published in the American Journal of Ophthalmology, researchers at the University of California reported that people diagnosed with glaucoma had ‘significantly’ higher levels of immunoglobulin E (IgE), a type of allergic antibody produced by the body in response to cats.

14.3% of glaucoma sufferers had significantly elevated levels of IgE to cats compared to 10% of the normal population. But dog allergens appear to behave slightly differently where IgE to dog allergens were elevated in 6% of glaucoma patients, but 9.2% of the normal population thus suggesting that exposure to cats may increase your risk of glaucoma and dogs  may actually lower your risk.

Researchers believe that their findings raise the possibility that the immune system plays a role in glaucoma.

So should you kick Fluffy out now and buy a dog? Of course not. The study did not assess different subtypes of glaucoma and their relationship with IgE, and only tests these few specific IgE levels. A lot more research needs to be done before these results would mean much. In the meantime could the research help contribute towards a future possible immunisation against glaucoma, or enable blood testing to help more accurately predict those at risk? It is possible. I’ll keep you posted.