The association between oxygen saturation and cataract disease and related factors in Birjand Vali-asr Hospital

Introduction: Any opacity of lens is defined as cataract. This leads to reduced vision that is the most common cause of blindness in the world in among the elderly. There is no non-surgical treatment for cataract patients; thereby, patients have to spend a lot of money especially those residing in the undeveloped countries. It is thus necessary to be informed of predisposing factors in order to plan prevention strategies. Oxidative damage is a major cause or consequence of cortical and nuclear cataracts. This study planned to compare oxygen saturation levels in cataract and non-cataract persons so that a way can be found to reduce or delay cataract formation. Methods: This study was performed on 135 cases and 136 age and sex-matching controls who referred to Vali-asr Hospital of Birjand. Information concerning oxygen saturation in the two groups was recorded in a checklist covering demographics, history of systemic diseases, drug consumption, ultraviolet exposure time, history of chronic eye diseases, and ocular trauma. The collected data were analyzed by T-test and ANOVA using SPSS software. P values lower than 0.05 were considered statistically significant. Results: The mean Oxygen saturation level had a statistically significant relation between cases and control groups (P=0.041).This relation was also statistically significant between smoking (p=0.02), Ultraviolet exposure time (p=0.013) and ocular trauma (p=0.05) but it was insignificant in place of live p=0.22, (city or village), chronic systemic diseases p=0.08, chronic ocular diseases (p=0.69) and drug consumption (p=0.19). Conclusions: This study showed that low oxygen saturation can be a risk factor for cataract disease. Therefore, we offer another study as a preventive strategy of cataract.