Background Most available studies focusing on the association between neovascular age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and dementia have conflicting results. This study aimed to investigate the association between previously diagnosed AMD and dementia using a population-based dataset in Taiwan. Methods Data for this case-control study were retrospectively collected from the Taiwan National Health Insurance Research Database. We identified 13,402 subjects who had a diagnosis of dementia as cases, and 40,206 subjects without dementia as controls. A conditional logistic regression was used to examine the association of dementia with previously diagnosed neovascular AMD. Results We found that of the study sample of 53,608 subjects, 1.01% had previously diagnosed neovascular AMD, 1.35% and 0.90% for cases and the controls, respectively (p<0.001). The conditional logistic regression analysis suggested that the odds ratio of prior neovascular AMD for cases was 1.37 (95% confidence interval: 1.14~1.65) compared to the controls after adjusting for subjects’ age, monthly income, geographic location, urbanization level, and hyperlipidemia, diabetes, hypertension, stroke, ischemic heart disease, and whether or not a subjects underwent cataract surgery prior to index date than controls. Conclusions Dementia subjects were associated with a higher proportion of prior neovascular AMD than were the controls.
Department of Ophthalmology, Taipei Medical University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan;Sleep Research Center, Taipei Medical University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan;Department of Internal Medicine, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan;Graduate Institute of Life Science, National Defense Medical Center, Taipei, Taiwan;Sleep Research Center, Taipei Medical University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan;School of Health Care Administration, Taipei Medical University, Taipei, Taiwan;School of Health Care Administration, Taipei Medical University, Taipei, Taiwan;Division of Gastroenterology, Department of Internal Medicine, Cathay General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan;Department of Neurology, Taipei Medical University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan;Department of Neurology, School of Medicine, College of Medicine, Taipei Medical University, Taipei, Taiwan
Recommended Citation:
Shiu-Dong Chung,Cha-Ze Lee,Li-Ting Kao,et al. Association between Neovascular Age-Related Macular Degeneration and Dementia: A Population-Based Case-Control Study in Taiwan[J]. PLOS ONE,2015-01-01,10(3)