Are Cataract Rates Declining?
Findings of the Beaver Dam Eye Study The population-based Beaver Dam Eye Study was designed by Barbara E. K. Klein, MD, MPH, and colleagues to determine through long-term observation whether there were differences among age cohorts regarding rates of cataract prevalence and surgery, as well as type of cataract. Five-thousand residents of Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, were examined for the three most common forms of cataract nuclear, cortical and posterior sub-capsular—at baseline in 1990 and five, 10 and 15 years later. Results were analyzed by age group and gender for this population, which was 99 percent white. The rates of all three cataracts increased with age for all cohorts and are described in the study in detail by age cohort and gender. An interesting decline in prevalence of nuclear cataract—the type characterized by hardening of the center of the eye’s lens—was found when participants were considered in five-year age and birth cohorts (excluding the 75+ group, which had too f
