Researchers Discover New Comorbidities Linked to Fuchs’ Dystrophy

Fuchs’ endothelial corneal dystrophy is known for its progressive nature, leading to vision loss and possible management with keratoplasty. Photo: Christine Sindt, OD. Click image to enlarge. A study published in 2021 observed the relationship between oxidative stress and cardiometabolic conditions.1 This report implied that type 2 diabetes, hypertension, hypercholesterolemia, coronary artery disease, myocardial infarction, congestive heart failure, cerebrovascular disease, peripheral artery disease, non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and obesity are pathophysiological mechanisms in Fuchs’ endothelial corneal dystrophy. Recently, a study published in Ophthalmology examined associations between Fuchs’ and these interconnected cardiovascular and metabolic disorders.2Researchers from Canada used records from the National Institutes of Health’s All of Us database. They identified 548 subjects with Fuchs’ who met the study’s criteria and 5,480 subjects for the control group.“In this large, diverse US cohort, individuals with Fuchs’ dystrophy had a greater prevalence of common cardiometabolic comorbidities than matched controls,” shared the authors in their study’s paper. “Further research is warranted to clarify underlying mechanisms and clinical implications.”What were the study’s findings? Researchers found that patients with Fuchs’ were more likely to have prior cardiometabolic diseases compared to controls; however, not all conditions differed. Type 2 diabetes (19.3% vs. 15.5%), hypertension (52.7% vs. 41.1%), hypercholesterolemia (25.9% vs. 20.9%), cerebrovascular disease (9.7% vs. 6.0%) and obesity (26.5% vs. 19.7%) differed greatly, while others did not.Additionally, patients with a history of cardiometabolic diseases were more likely to develop Fuchs’, with odds increasing as the number of diseases rose. The odds ratio was the lowest for patients with one condition listed in their history (OR=1.54). Two conditions resulted in an OR of 2.05. Patients with three or more conditions had the highest odds, with a reported OR of 2.12.There were limitations to this study, including possible misclassification of diagnoses and missing covariates from subjects. These were noted by the authors in their paper, but they also mention that this study was meant to perpetuate thought and future study design. They concluded, “Given the observational design, all results should be considered hypothesis-generating rather than causal.”Click here for the journal source. 1. Akhigbe RE, Ajayi AF, Ram SK. Oxidative stress and cardiometabolic disorders. Biomed Res Int 2021;2021:9872109.2. Mihalache A, Huang RS, Popovic MM, et al. Fuchs’ endothelial corneal dystrophy and cardiometabolic comorbidities. Ophthalmology. March 4, 2026. [Epub ahead of print]. This article was developed by the editorial staff in conjunction with experts in the field. In the process, AI may have been among the editorial tools used to meet the goals of human editors, who approved all content.