Smoking (2009) Additional Risk Factor in Elder Women for Glaucoma

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Researchers sampled the fluid in the eye and blood of 120 female glaucoma patients (age 40-90) who were smokers (40), ex-smokers (40) and non-smokers (40). Both inflammation and cell death processes were studied using techniques of enzyme immunoassay and western blot procedures. They looked at the interleukin-6 (a protein that stimulates immune responses in the body) as a marker of inflammation marker and caspase-3 (a protein involved in stages of cell death) and poly (ADP-ribose) polymerase 1 (a protein involved in DNA repair and cell death) as apoptosis (cell death) "markers".

They found that Inflammation and cell death marker levels increased in samples taken from the women who smoked and concluded that smoking could be an important additional risk factor for glaucoma progression in elderly women.

Published: Zanon-Moreno V, Garcia-Medina JJ, Zanon-Viguer V, et al. Smoking, an additional risk factor in elder women with primary open-angle glaucoma. Mol Vis 2009;15:2953-2959.