Many
vices have been attributed to making you go blind, but wearing a tie is the new
way to bad sight, according to research.
A
study in the British Journal of Ophthalmology, giving fuel to advocates of the
dress-down day, says a tie can be the cause of glaucoma.
Tightness
around the neck restricts the jugular vein, which raises blood pressure,
particularly in the eyeball. The effect can be so serious that even wearing a
tie to an eye test can lead to a false diagnosis of high eyeball pressure or
glaucoma.
Glaucoma
occurs when liquid excreted around the lens and the iris if the eye cannot
drain properly, and the optic nerve is damaged.
Researchers
in New York have found that 60 per cent of those studied without glaucoma, and
70 per cent of those with healthy eyes suffered an increase in internal eye
pressure after wearing a tie for three minutes.
In
each case, the ties were tightened around a button collar to ‘the point of
slight discomfort’. The subjects then wore open neck shirts and their blood
pressure dropped.
The
study said: "A tight necktie can be considered a risk factor in men who
prefer to wear tight neckties, men with thick necks and white-collar
professionals.
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"The
pressure increase is real but would not have been present had the patient not
had the constriction round his neck."
