Glaucoma patients twice as likely to have reading impairments, study says

Baltimore

-A recent study found that people with bilateral glaucoma read 29 words per minute slower than those without glaucoma and were twice as likely to have a reading impairment.

Those with unilateral glaucoma had the same rates as those without the condition. Study authors from the Wilmer Eye Institute, Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, noted that education levels and race also may have played into the lower scores.

"As reading out loud was necessary to measure reading speed, racial differences in speaking rates could account for the difference in the measured reading rate," the authors wrote. "Future work should evaluate reading in subjects with glaucoma under more realistic conditions to further explore if reading impairment is more prevalent than reported herein."