One medical problem often raises the risk of another, too. New evidence indicates that this may be true for myopic patients and glaucoma.

Researchers in Australia studied 3,645 myopic patients ages 49 to 97 years, characterized as having low, moderate or high myopia. Glaucoma in these patients was diagnosed from visual field loss combined with optic disk cupping and rim thinning.

The doctors found that 4.2% of low myopic and 4.4% of moderate-to-high myopic eyes had glaucoma, compared with 1.5% of eyes without myopia. This risk was independent of other glaucoma risk factors and intraocular pressure.