A new study led by Danish researcher Dr. Paulus de Jong from the Netherlands Institute for Neuroscience and Academic Medical Center has been published in the Medical Journal Ophthalmology and reported in Reuters and again on Fox News.com . ( no author noted) In it de Jong and his team say that older people who take an aspirin every day to stave off heart disease are putting themselves at risk for developing the vision robbing disease, macular degeneration (MD).
Macular degeneration is the leading cause of onset blindness in older Americans and affects millions of people the world over. It is a disease related to aging and robs its victims of their sight by destroying cells in the macula; the yellow spot near the center of the retina. Some cases can be treated with laser coagulation techniques and pharmaceuticals, but many patients slowly succumb to total blindness. Also, MD comes in two varieties, wet and dry, with wet being the most severe.
Dr. de Jong and his team looked at the medical records of 4,700 adults age 65 and older and compared rates of MD of those that took aspirin daily, to those that did not. For those not taking aspirin daily, they found MD rates of 2% of all those studied, whereas for the group that was taking aspirin daily, the rate doubled to 4%. Dr. de Jong and his term are not claiming that aspirin causes MD, but that it appears to somehow cause it to come about more easily.
Aspirin has long been known to thin the blood, which is how it alleviates pain, by reducing inflammation in areas affected and lowering blood pressure. The problem though, is that blood thinning agents tend to act more strongly on parts of the body that have very thin veins or capillaries in them, such as the eyes. It was for this reason that de Jong and his team began looking into the medical records of older patients to see if there were any eye problems associated with extended use of aspirin.
Jong and his group aren’t suggesting people stop taking aspirin daily, though they do suggest older people speak with their doctor about the potential risks involved, and be extra diligent in being tested for signs of MD as they age. He also says that larger studies need to be done to see more accurately just what is going on with older patients and MD, and to see if aspirin might be causing an acceleration in the progression of the disease in patients as well.