Glaucoma fought by Vitamin D - many studies

8+ VitaminDWiki pages with GLAUCOMA in the title

Search for Glaucoma and "Vitamin D" 18,200 studies

Google Scholar July 2026

  • Association of the Severity of Primary Open-Angle Glaucoma with Serum Vitamin D Levels - Dec 2023 - DOI: 10.21608/bmfj.2023.250567.1960 FREE PDF

  • Vitamin D and Glaucoma: A Critical Review of the Literature - Nov 2020 https://doi.org/10.1155/2020/8071280 Might help, FREE PDF

  • Vitamin D and its receptor polymorphisms are associated with glaucoma - Dec 2020 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jfo.2020.02.016 meta-analysis

    • 3.1X more likely to have Glaucoma if a specific poor Vitamin D Receptor

    • Note: You can have a good blood level of Vitamin D, but little gets to the cells if a poor VDR

Search for Glaucoma and "Vitamin D receptor" 1,390+ studies

As of July 2026

  • Vitamin D and its receptor polymorphisms are associated with glaucoma - Dec 2020 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jfo.2020.02.016 PDF is behind a paywall
    significant association between glaucoma and allelic (b vs. B, OR = 1.84, 95% CI = 1.37–2.46, P = 0.00001) and recessive (bb vs. Bb + BB, OR = 3.16, models of VDR BsmI (rs1544410) polymorphism,

  • Vitamin D and Glaucoma: A Critical Review of the Literature Nov 2020 https://doi.org/10.1155/2020/8071280 FREE PDF

  • Vitamin D and its Relationship to Ocular Diseases: A Systematic Review - 2024 https://doi.org/10.1055/s-0043-1762915 FREE PDF

Related in VitaminDWiki

Glacoma is 2.6 X more likely in persons with Diabetes - April 2024

One possible pathway: Diabetes deactivates the VDR, which results in less Vitamin D getting to cells - such as in the eye

Vitamin D Receptor deactivated by some health problems - many studies

Asked Perplexity AI: Is diabetic retinopathy related to glaucoma?**

Yes, diabetic retinopathy is related to glaucoma , particularly in the context of neovascular glaucoma and potentially primary open-angle glaucoma (POAG). Diabetic retinopathy (DR) is a complication of diabetes characterized by damage to the blood vessels in the retina, which can lead to vision impairment and blindness. This condition can influence the development of glaucoma in several ways:

Neovascular Glaucoma: Diabetic retinopathy can lead to the formation of new, abnormal blood vessels on the retina and the iris, a condition known as neovascularization. These new vessels can block the natural drainage of aqueous humor from the eye, leading to increased intraocular pressure (IOP), which is a primary factor in glaucoma. Neovascular glaucoma is a specific type of glaucoma directly associated with diabetic retinopathy and is considered a severe and difficult-to-treat form of the disease

Primary Open-Angle Glaucoma (POAG): The relationship between diabetic retinopathy and POAG is more complex and less direct. Some studies suggest that diabetic retinopathy may be associated with or even predict the development of POAG. This is thought to be due to overlapping pathophysiological mechanisms, such as neurodegeneration and impairment of vascular supply to the optic nerve head, which are common in both conditions

. However, the evidence is not entirely consistent, and more research is needed to clarify this relationship.

Impact on Glaucoma Management: The presence of diabetic retinopathy can complicate the diagnosis and management of glaucoma. For example, changes in the retina and optic nerve due to diabetic retinopathy can interfere with the assessment of glaucoma through imaging and functional tests. This makes it challenging to distinguish between damage caused by glaucoma and changes resulting from diabetic retinopathy

In summary, while diabetic retinopathy is directly linked to the development of neovascular glaucoma, its relationship with primary open-angle glaucoma is less clear and subject to ongoing research. Nonetheless, the presence of diabetic retinopathy in a patient with diabetes necessitates careful monitoring and management of potential glaucoma to prevent vision loss

Click here for references

Glaucoma on the web

  • Glaucoma: A hidden threat to vision health rising swiftly - September 2023 MDEdge

    • "Glaucoma is the second leading cause of blindness worldwide, affecting 3 million people in the United States, and yet half of those affected are unaware, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention."

    • "Five % of 70-year-olds had the disease, and half of those did not know they had it before they took part in the study."

    • "Five percent of 560 70-year-olds had the disease, and half of those did not know they had it before they took part in the study."

  • Glaucoma in the African American and Hispanic Communities: What We Know in 2023

    • "Adjusting for age, African Americans were 3 to 4 times more likely to have a diagnosis of glaucoma compared to Caucasians."

  • Note: One indication that a disease is related to Vitamin D is if it is more prominent in people with dark skin (they get less D from the sun)

Note: Topical Vitamin D gets 100X more vitamin D to the topical spot than oral Vitamin D

Topical Vitamin D examples:

  • Nanoemulsion drops on eye lids or perhaps on eyes

  • Vitamin D spray on eye lids

  • Ultraviolet light (with closed eyes)

This Vitamin Reverses GLAUCOMA (Vitamin D) - Dr. Berg Video May 2024

8 minutes

  • 0:00 Introduction: What is glaucoma?
  • 0:46 Facts about glaucoma
  • 1:38 Glaucoma and vitamin D
  • 3:29 Vitamin D resistance
  • 5:05 Vitamin D dosage (1,000 IU/kg of body weight)
    and reduce Calcium, increase Mg, K2, and water (all of which reduce Calcium buildup)

Best VDR activators for Glaucoma: Magnesium citrate or glycinate

Claude AI, July 2026

Question: The many supplements that activate the Vitamin D Receptor include Magnesium, Omega-3, Resveratrol, Quercetin , Zinc, Boron, ginger, curcumin, Progesterone, Sulfroaphane, Butyrate, and Berberine. Is there any hint as to which one is best for Glaucoma?

Short answer: of your twelve, only two have actual human data in glaucoma or IOP — magnesium and omega-3 — and magnesium is the one with the strongest "hint" because it has repeated (if small) trials showing functional visual-field improvement, not just pressure change.

Here's how they tier out for glaucoma specifically:

Tier 1 — human evidence

Magnesium is the standout. A small RCT found 300 mg/day oral magnesium citrate for one month improved visual field mean deviation and pattern standard deviation without changing ocular blood flow, and an earlier study reported that after four weeks both visual field and peripheral blood flow improved. Mechanistically it fits glaucoma unusually well: it improves blood flow by modifying endothelial function via endothelin-1 and nitric oxide, and is neuroprotective by blocking NMDA-related calcium influx and inhibiting glutamate release. That dual hit — vascular dysregulation and excitotoxicity — is exactly the normal-tension glaucoma phenotype, which is why it keeps showing up in the Flammer-syndrome literature too.

Omega-3 is the other one with human IOP data. A pooled analysis of two double-masked RCTs (n=105) found roughly an 8% IOP reduction after three months versus a slight increase in the placebo group, plus a herring-caviar-oil pilot in IOP-controlled POAG suggesting neuroprotection. Caveat: the strong IOP RCT was in normotensive adults, not glaucoma patients.

Tier 2 — strong preclinical, thin human

Resveratrol has the deepest animal literature — a meta-analysis of 30 preclinical studies found it increased RGC survival and slowed retinal thinning, and topical trans-resveratrol reduced IOP up to 25% in steroid-induced ocular hypertension via adenosine A₁ agonism — but human clinical trials remain limited. Curcumin is similar: promising RGC-protection preclinically, with bioavailability the limiting factor, addressed by nanocarrier eye-drop formulations.

Tier 3 — mechanistic only

Quercetin, zinc, boron, ginger, progesterone, sulforaphane, butyrate, and berberine have essentially no glaucoma-specific human or even robust preclinical RGC data. Plausible on oxidative-stress/inflammation grounds, but nothing I'd rank.

What this does NOT show — worth flagging in your usual style:

  • None of these has an RCT demonstrating slowed progression (RGC/visual-field loss over years). Magnesium's trials are ~30 patients and one month; that's a signal, not proof.
  • The glaucoma benefit for the two Tier-1 compounds does not clearly run through the VDR. Magnesium's effect is calcium-channel/NMDA/endothelial; omega-3's is docosanoid/anti-inflammatory/vascular. So if you're building a VDR-activation narrative, glaucoma is a case where the best-supported members of your list help via non-VDR mechanisms. The honest framing is "VDR-activating supplements that also happen to have glaucoma evidence," not "help glaucoma because they activate VDR."
  • The compound with the best recent human neuroprotection data in glaucoma isn't on your list at all — nicotinamide (B3), which has a crossover RCT showing improved inner-retinal function. Adjacent to your interests if you're doing a glaucoma page.

If I had to give one actionable line: magnesium (as citrate or glycinate, ~300 mg/day) is the best-hinted single agent, with omega-3 as a reasonable co-intervention on IOP grounds — and both belong in a "reduces vascular dysregulation / excitotoxicity" bucket rather than a VDR bucket.

What are the best supplements to treat Glaucoma?

Claude AI, July 2026

For glaucoma specifically, the field has shifted hard toward neuroprotection (protecting retinal ganglion cells independent of pressure), because a large fraction of patients keep losing vision despite well-controlled IOP. That reframing changes which supplements matter. Here's the current landscape by evidence tier:

Tier 1 — human RCT evidence, now with professional-society attention

Nicotinamide (vitamin B3) + pyruvate is the clear front-runner. The phase 2 RCT (32 open-angle glaucoma patients) found that 3 g/day nicotinamide plus 3 g/day calcium pyruvate for nine weeks improved a median of 8 visual-field test locations versus placebo, and a separate 12-week Australian crossover RCT (57 patients) at 3 g/day nicotinamide improved inner-retinal function on electroretinography. This got enough traction that the American Glaucoma Society and AAO issued a joint position statement in 2025, and a phase 3 trial (Columbia/Stanford, 21 months, 3 g/day NAM + 1 g/day pyruvate) is running. This is as close to "endorsed adjunct" as the supplement world gets in glaucoma.

Citicoline is the other Tier 1 entry, and it's already marketed as a glaucoma adjunct in parts of Europe. A randomized trial (n=73) found DHA + citicoline significantly improved visual-field mean defect and the VF slope over three months — notably, citicoline paired with DHA outperformed either alone. There's also an international multicenter crossover RCT on quality of life.

Tier 2 — human RCTs, smaller or phenotype-specific

Omega-3 (DHA/EPA): ~8% IOP reduction in a normotensive RCT, plus a POAG neuroprotection pilot; works best as the DHA partner to citicoline rather than solo.

Magnesium: small RCTs showing visual-field improvement, via a vascular (endothelin-1/NO) plus anti-excitotoxic (NMDA blockade) mechanism — best suited to the normal-tension / Flammer-syndrome vasospastic phenotype.

Ginkgo biloba: a randomized crossover trial in Chinese normal-tension glaucoma patients showed visual-field improvement, consistent with its ocular-blood-flow effect. Again, an NTG/vascular-phenotype agent.

Tier 3 — strong preclinical, thin human

Resveratrol (30-study preclinical meta-analysis, SIRT1-mediated RGC survival; topical lowered IOP in animals), curcumin (RGC protection preclinically, bioavailability-limited, nanocarrier eye-drops in development), and emerging players like saffron/crocin, CoQ10, and taurine.

If you want the one-line practical hierarchy: nicotinamide + pyruvate is the best-evidenced and most actively validated; citicoline + DHA is the most established in actual clinical practice; magnesium and ginkgo are the picks for the normal-tension/vascular phenotype; omega-3 is a sensible general adjunct.

What this does NOT show — the honest caveats for your curation:

  • Every Tier 1/2 endpoint is a functional or structural research measure (visual-field locations, ERG, RNFL) over weeks to months. None has yet proven it slows long-term progression or produces patient-meaningful vision recovery — that's exactly what the ongoing phase 3 nicotinamide trials are meant to answer.
  • Nicotinamide at 3 g/day has produced documented drug-induced liver injury cases in these trials (including one in an underweight patient). At gram-level dosing this is a real monitoring issue, not a trivial vitamin — worth flagging prominently on any page.
  • These are all adjuncts to IOP-lowering, not replacements. The entire premise is "additional benefit on top of controlled pressure."
  • The IOP-lowering evidence (omega-3, magnesium) and the neuroprotection evidence (nicotinamide, citicoline) are largely separate mechanisms — a page that conflates "lowers pressure" with "protects the nerve" would be miscategorizing them.

One curation note for you: the strongest-evidenced agents here (nicotinamide, citicoline, pyruvate) are all NAD⁺/mitochondrial-bioenergetic or membrane-synthesis plays, not VDR-axis compounds — so this is a good case study in your "profitable ignorance" frame, since NAM and pyruvate are cheap and unpatentable, yet a professional society is now writing position statements on them largely on academic/foundation-funded trial money.