Diet Soda Linked to Increased Risk for Diabetic Retinopathy
Drinking diet soda may increase the risk for proliferative diabetic retinopathy, according to a study published online in the September/October issue of Clinical and Experimental Ophthalmology, as reported in Medscape.
The study is the first to evaluate the link between soft drink consumption and microvascular complications of diabetes.
“In our clinical sample of people with diabetes, consuming more than four cans, or 1.5 liters, of diet soft drinks per week was associated with a twofold increased risk of having proliferative diabetic retinopathy,” first author Eva Fenwick, PhD, told Medscape Medical News. Fenwick is a clinical research fellow at the Singapore Eye Research Institute and an assistant professor at the Duke-NUS Medical School, Singapore.