A major study of Medicare beneficiaries shows that the risk of
hip fractures was significantly reduced in patients who had had
cataract surgery, compared to patients who did not undergo the
procedure. Published in the August edition of the Journal of the
American Medical Association (JAMA) the researchers believe
their study is the first to demonstrate that cataract surgery
reduces the rate of fractures in older patients with vision
loss. This suggests that cataract surgery could be an effective
intervention to help prevent fractures and reduce associated
morbidity and costs. The American Academy of Ophthalmology and
the Jules Stein Eye Institute at the University of California,
Los Angeles, collaborated on the study. The study tracked hip
fracture incidence in a cohort of Medicare patients with
cataracts from 2002-09. Anne L. Coleman, M.D., Ph.D., the Fran
and Ray Stark professor of ophthalmology at the Jules Stein Eye
Institute at UCLA and director of the Academy's Hoskins Center
for Quality Eye Care, led t