This study by Alan Y. Huang, Joshua R. Ehrlich, and Ali G. Hamedani examines the relationship between visual impairment, age-related eye disease, and sleep disturbances in older adults in the United States. The authors used data from the National Health and Aging Trends Study (NHATS) to assess vision through self-report and objective assessments, and identified age-related eye diseases using Medicare claims data.
Key findings from the study indicate that self-reported visual difficulty is associated with increased sleep medication use in older adults. The study highlights the complex relationship between vision and sleep in older adults, an area where both visual impairment and sleep dysfunction are common.
Research has increasingly shown that healthy vision is not only important for everyday tasks such as reading, but is also a significant determinant of overall health and functional outcomes in older adults. This study adds to that body of work by highlighting its role in sleep and medication use, and we will be looking more closely at medication prescription patterns in the visually impaired population in the future.
This study was sponsored by the Penn Medicine Alumni Fellowship in Public and Global Health Policy, National Eye Institute, and SENSE Network through a grant from the National Institute on Aging.