Exfoliation Syndrome and Systemic Cardiovascular Diseases

Exfoliation syndrome (XFS) is a systemic condition. Intraocular alterations represent only a part of the exfoliation-related clinical signs. Exfoliation material has been identified in the visceral organs, skin, and vessel walls. This triggered several studies that investigated association between XFS and cardiovascular diseases. In many populations, significant associations between XFS and various systemic vascular diseases including elevated plasma homocysteine level, myocardial dysfunction, stroke, aortic aneurysm, and white matter lesions were found. Some of these XFS-associated vascular diseases are caused by elastosis of the vessel wall, which may be directly related to general extracellular dysfunction in XFS. Another part of the pathologic vascular alterations (reduced cutaneous capillary flow reactions, impaired baroreflex sensitivity, parasympathetic cardiovascular neuropathy, and pathologic heart rate variability indices), however, suggests that vascular dysregulation beyond the age-related normal decline may also play a role both in the development and worsening of the systemic cardiovascular diseases in XFS. The exact mechanism of the development of systemic vascular dysregulation associated with XFS is currently unknown.