Jeon HS, et al. - Authors gauged the relationship of atopic dermatitis (AD) with subsequent cataract development and cataract surgery in a Korean pediatric population. Even after 10 years of observation, absolute risk of cataract with or without AD was rare. Nonetheless, an elevated risk for cataracts requiring surgery was noted in the findings. They also found that the risk for cataract development and cataract surgery could be increased by disease severity.

Methods

• Nationally representative data from the Korean National Health Insurance Service database from 2002 to 2013 was used in this population-based retrospective longitudinal cohort study.
• Authors matched the incident AD cases, consisting of patients younger than 20 years having AD and severe AD to 4 controls each using propensity score derived from age, sex, residential area, and household income.
• They compared the incidence probabilities of cataract development and cataract surgery between the AD group and controls using Kaplan-Meier methods and log-rank tests.
• For cataract and cataract surgery to determine the risk factors in the matched cohort, Cox proportional hazard models were fitted.

Results

• Findings suggested that out of 34,375 patients with incident AD (16,159 girls [47%]; mean [SD] age, 3.47 [4.96] years), there were 3734 severe AD cases (10.9%) with 137,500 matched controls.
• Results demonstrated that the development of cataracts was not different between the AD and control groups, (0.216% vs 0.227%; 95% CI, -0.041% to 0.063%;P = .32) or between the severe AD cohort and their controls (0.520% vs 0.276%; 95% CI, -0.073% to 0.561%;P = .06).
• As per data, more frequently cataract surgery was performed in the AD cohort than in the control group (0.075% vs 0.041%; 95% CI, 0.017%-0.050%;P = .02) and in the severe AD cohort compared with their controls (0.221% vs 0.070%; 95% CI, 0.021%-0.279%;P = .03).
• Researchers noted an association of severe AD with both development of cataract (adjusted hazard ratio, 1.94; 95% CI, 1.06-3.58,P = .03) and requirement for cataract surgery (adjusted hazard ratio, 5.48; 95% CI, 1.90-15.79,P = .002).