Youssef Usama Mahmoud, Raya Yasser Mohamed, Sehlo Mohammad Gamal, Gado Osama Mohamed, Hussien Fayza Mohammed, Gad Ahmed Am, Said Mervat
Psychiatry Department, Faculty of Medicine, Zagazig University, P. O. Box 44519, Zagazig, Egypt.
Ophthalmology Department, Zagazig University, Zagazig, Egypt.
Ann Gen Psychiatry. 2025 Apr 28;24(1):25. doi: 10.1186/s12991-025-00562-0.
The eyes serve as a portal to the brain and are highly connected neurologically, making them the only externally visible part of the brain. Moreover, the correlation between the physical attributes of the eye and psychiatric disorders has been increasingly established in recent years. Therefore, this study examined the association between iris color density and bipolar I disorder (BD).
In a case-control study, 48 subjects diagnosed with BD are compared to an equal number of healthy controls. A semi-structured interview questionnaire is designed to collect sociodemographic, psychiatric, medical history, and clinical data from all participants. The Group with BD is diagnosed based on clinical assessment by the Consultant/specialist by using a semi-structured clinical interview for DSM 5 Clinician Version (SCID-5-CV) to diagnose BD's current episode and to exclude the other comorbid mental disorders. Additionally, the group with BD is further assessed by The Young Mania Rating Scale (YMRS) and Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS) to evaluate the severity of manic and depressive symptoms. The iris color of participants in both groups was evaluated using a standardized photographic system for iris imaging.
It showed a statistically significant increase in the percentage of the colored iris in the patients' group compared with the control group, and the presence of a colored iris significantly increases the risk of BD by 2.36 folds. There is no statistically significant difference between iris color and either hospitalization, suicide, Electroconvulsive Therapy (ECT), family history, medical history, duration, or frequency of episodes.
Our findings revealed a strong association between iris color and bipolar disorder (BD) but no significant association between iris color and clinical factors such as hospitalization, suicide, electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), family history, medical history, or the duration and frequency of episodes. These results suggest that iris color may serve as a trait marker rather than a state marker in BD, potentially offering a simple and non-invasive indicator of bipolarity.
眼睛是通往大脑的门户，在神经学上高度相连，使其成为大脑唯一可从外部看到的部分。此外，近年来眼睛的物理属性与精神疾病之间的关联越来越明确。因此，本研究探讨了虹膜颜色密度与双相I型障碍（BD）之间的关联。
在一项病例对照研究中，将48名被诊断为BD的受试者与同等数量的健康对照进行比较。设计了一份半结构化访谈问卷，以收集所有参与者的社会人口统计学、精神病学、病史和临床数据。BD组通过顾问/专家使用针对DSM 5临床医生版本的半结构化临床访谈（SCID-5-CV）进行临床评估来诊断BD的当前发作，并排除其他共病精神障碍。此外，BD组通过青年躁狂评定量表（YMRS）和汉密尔顿抑郁评定量表（HDRS）进一步评估，以评估躁狂和抑郁症状的严重程度。使用标准化的虹膜成像摄影系统评估两组参与者的虹膜颜色。
结果显示，与对照组相比，患者组中有色虹膜的百分比有统计学显著增加，并且有色虹膜的存在使患BD的风险显著增加2.36倍。虹膜颜色与住院、自杀、电休克治疗（ECT）、家族史、病史、发作持续时间或发作频率之间没有统计学显著差异。
我们的研究结果揭示了虹膜颜色与双相情感障碍（BD）之间存在密切关联，但虹膜颜色与住院、自杀、电休克治疗（ECT）、家族史、病史或发作持续时间和频率等临床因素之间没有显著关联。这些结果表明，虹膜颜色可能作为BD的一种特质标记而非状态标记，有可能提供一种简单且非侵入性的双相情感障碍指标。
