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Original research
Illicit drug use and self-reported vision loss among military service members or veterans
  1. Justin Tyler McDaniel1,
  2. W D Jenkins2,
  3. D L Albright3,
  4. D Null1,
  5. S McIntosh3 and
  6. M R McDaniel4
  1. 1 School of Human Sciences, Southern Illinois University Carbondale, Carbondale, Illinois, USA
  2. 2 Population Science and Policy, Southern Illinois University School of Medicine, Springfield, Illinois, USA
  3. 3 School of Social Work, The University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, Alabama, USA
  4. 4 College of Adult and Graduate Studies, Colorado Christian University, Lakewood, Colorado, USA
  1. Correspondence to Dr Justin Tyler McDaniel, School of Human Sciences, Southern Illinois University Carbondale, Carbondale, IL 62901, USA; jtmcd{at}siu.edu

Abstract

Introduction Little is known about differences in vision loss prevalence among service members or veterans (SMVs) and civilians; further, no study has compared vision loss risk factors in these two populations. As such, we seek to fill this gap in the literature.

Methods In this cross sectional study, we obtained data on 106 SMVs and 1572 civilians from the 2013–2018 National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys. We compared the prevalence of or mean values of vision loss risk factors between SMVs and civilians using the Wald χ2 statistic or Kruskal-Wallis test. Further, we examined the relative strength of 17 vision loss risk factors in predicting self-reported vision loss via Firth’s logistic regression.

Results SMVs had a significantly higher prevalence of illicit drug use (20.75% vs 13.62%) and HIV (1.89% vs 0.41%), while civilians had a higher prevalence of poor dietary habits (7.61% vs 13.21%). SMVs also had higher mean values of systolic blood pressure (125.85 vs 122.53 mmHg), pack years of cigarette smoking (8.29 vs 4.25), and sedentary minutes per day (379.15 vs 337.07 min). More SMVs (8.49%) self-reported vision loss than civilians (4.48%). After adjustment for covariates, illicit drug use (adjusted β coefficient=0.72, p=0.02) was associated with self-reported vision loss.

Conclusions This study indicates that self-reported vision loss among SMVs is more prevalent than among civilians, and vision loss in SMVs is associated with severe or prolonged illicit drug use.

  • health informatics
  • epidemiology
  • HIV & AIDS
  • ophthalmology
  • substance misuse

Data availability statement

Data are available in a public, open access repository. Data are available from the following website: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nhanes/index.htm.

https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjmilitary-2020-001518

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    Data availability statement

    Data are available in a public, open access repository. Data are available from the following website: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nhanes/index.htm.

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    Footnotes

    • Twitter @jtmcdaniel88

    • Contributors All authors contributed to this manuscript equally.

    • Funding The authors have not declared a specific grant for this research from any funding agency in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

    • Competing interests None declared.

    • Provenance and peer review Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

    • Supplemental material This content has been supplied by the author(s). It has not been vetted by BMJ Publishing Group Limited (BMJ) and may not have been peer-reviewed. Any opinions or recommendations discussed are solely those of the author(s) and are not endorsed by BMJ. BMJ disclaims all liability and responsibility arising from any reliance placed on the content. Where the content includes any translated material, BMJ does not warrant the accuracy and reliability of the translations (including but not limited to local regulations, clinical guidelines, terminology, drug names and drug dosages), and is not responsible for any error and/or omissions arising from translation and adaptation or otherwise.