Smoking and Alcoholism, Risk Factors for Papillitis?

Introduction. Papillitis is the inflammation of the optic nerve at the level of the optic papilla or optic disc. We did not find enough published studies that corroborate smoking and alcoholism as absolute risk factors for papillitis, however, it has been raised, so we were motivated to conduct this research, with the aim of identifying statistically significant causal association between these factors and papillitis in our hospital. Methodology. An analytical study of cases and controls was carried out in patients with papillitis treated at the Opthalmology Centre of Santiago de Cuba (2017–2019). Group 1 (Cases): 42 patients. Group 2 (Controls): 84 patients’ companions, who attended in the same period and did not present ophthalmological entities. Results. In the association of smoking with papillitis, we obtained an OR = 1.60, with CI: [0.74; 3.48], but p > 0.05. Alcoholism with papillitis resulted in an association with OR = 1.19, with CI: [0.53; 2.68] and p > 0.05. Conclusions. In our study, smoking and alcoholism had no statistically significant causal association with papillitis. Keywords: Alcoholism, smoking, papillitis, optic nerve, optic neuropathy