Diabetes as risk factor of cataract: differentiation by retroillumination photography and image analysis.

We performed an epidemiological study to identify risk factors of cataract based on 2,243 subjects who underwent a general health checkup. Each subject underwent a 75-gram oral glucose tolerance test and blood chemistry analysis. The prevalence rate of cataract was higher in diabetic subjects in their 50s than in nondiabetics in the same age range (p less than 0.01). The incidence of vesicular and radial lens opacity was higher in diabetics than in nondiabetics (p less than 0.05).