Long-term Uveitis Risk of GLP-1 Users Impacts Women More than Men

In adults aged 40 and older with type 2 diabetes who were treated with GLP-1 medications, men consistently presented a lower risk of developing uveitis than women across long-term periods of up to five years. Photo: Aaron Bronner, OD, and Alison Bozung, OD. Click image to enlarge. Patients with type 2 diabetes are known to be at higher risk of developing the inflammatory condition uveitis, which is known to potentially cause permanent vision loss if untreated. GLP-1 receptor agonists, common medications such as Ozempic (semaglutide, Novo Nordisk) and Trulicity (dulaglutide, Eli Lilly), are used for diabetes management and weight loss, gaining recent attention for their potential benefits for eye health.A study that was presented at ARVO 2026 this Sunday investigated whether men and women taking these medications develop uveitis at different rates over time. While the risk of uveitis was similar between men and women at the one-year follow-up, the researchers discovered that women were at higher risk of developing the condition during longer follow-up periods.“This potentially illustrates how sex-based differences in the use of GLP-1 medications may influence uveitis risk, highlighting the importance of needing to better approach adults with diabetes regarding eye health,” the researchers highlighted in their abstract.This retrospective cohort study used the TriNetX database to identify and include adults 40 years old and older with type 2 diabetes who received at least four prescriptions for a GLP-1 drug. Patients with a preexisting uveitis diagnosis or obesity diagnosis prior to the specific follow-up window were excluded from the analysis. Within this study, a total of 9,933 men and 9,402 women were selected. Following propensity score matching, 5,947 patients of each cohort were retained.Cox proportional hazards models determined that men demonstrated a lower yet nonsignificant hazard ratio of developing uveitis at one-year follow-up (hazard ratio; HR: 0.754). However, men exhibited significantly lower hazards at both the three-year (HR: 0.743) and five-year follow-ups (HR: 0.747).The researchers noted that their findings align with prior research displaying that women tend to develop uveitis more often than men.Original abstract ©2026 Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology.Click here for the journal source. Zdouq M, Abdel H, Abboud I, et al. Sex-based differences in uveitis risk among GLP-1 receptor agonist users in the US population. ARVO 2026 annual meeting. 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.