10 Things Your Eyes Say About You

November 18, 2014

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Forget the whole soul thing—the eyes are actually a window to your health. "Simply by looking in someone's eyes, we can see things like arteries, veins, and nerves, which are a reflection of what's going on in the rest of the body," says Rahul Khurana, MD, a retina specialist in northern California. That's why the American Academy of Ophthalmology recommends everyone get a baseline eye exam by age 40, if not before (if everything looks good, your doctor can decide how often you should follow up). The benefit, of course, is easily catching potential problems early on. Here, 10 important health conditions your eyes can signal.


You're seriously stressed.

You have high blood pressure.

You should eat more carrots.

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You're suffering from inflammation.
You've been waking up with achy, bloodshot eyes for a week, but you've been logging 8 hours of sleep every night and avoiding alcohol. What gives? The pain and redness may be a sign of uveitis–inflammation within the eye—and it can signal inflammation elsewhere in your body. The condition, which flares up when the immune system attacks its own tissues, is a marker in ailments from psoriasis and Crohn's to rheumatoid arthritis; the latter causes eye-related symptoms in 25% of sufferers. "When inflammation manifests itself in the eye, that often tips us off to other conditions," says Khurana.

Your thyroid is wonky.

Your IQ is impressive…or not.
Did you ace most of your college classes? Breeze through War and Peace? The blood vessels in your retina might be to thank. A 2013 study published in the journal Psychological Science found that the appearance of those vessels can determine your cognitive abilities. The study looked at the retinal vessels of adults in their 30s; people with narrower ones fared better on verbal comprehension and memory tests, while their wide-vesseled counterparts were found to have lower IQ scores, even after accounting for health and lifestyle risk factors. "The small vessels in the eye may reflect the condition of vessels inside the brain because they share similar size, structure and function," says Idan Shalev, PhD, an assistant professor of biobehavioral health at Penn State University and one of the study's authors. "They provide a window to study the health of the brain." (The next step for scientists: finding out why wider vessels are associated with poorer brain function.)

You have diabetes.

You have allergies.

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Are you battling under-eye circles that no amount of concealer can cover? Allergic rhinitis, which affects one in seven Americans and causes inflammation of the mucous membranes in the nose, could be the cause. Breathing in anything from pollen to pet hair can clog sinuses and trigger a reaction that causes blood to pool under the eyes (the thinnest-skinned spot on your body), which results in a bruise-like "allergic shiner." Thankfully, the problem can usually be fixed by popping an antihistamine. (Here's how the pros cover up dark circles.)

You're depressed.

MORE: 9 Surprising Signs Of Depression

Your nervous system is out of whack.
When it comes to nerve disorders like multiple sclerosis, the eyes can provide an early clue that something's wrong. That's because the optic nerve, which sits at the back of the eye and transmits details about what you see to the brain, is part of the central nervous system, the same network that MS affects. Inflammation in the nerve, called optic neuritis, is diagnosed in as many as 75% of MS patients, and in up to a quarter of cases, it's the first sign (along with blurred vision and pain when you move your eyes) that something is amiss.

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