What your eyes reveal about your health

Scientists at the University of California, San Diego, have developed a smartphone app that can detect early signs of Alzheimer’s disease and other neurological conditions. The app uses the phone’s near-infrared camera to track changes in the size of a person’s pupils at a sub-millimetre level. These measurements can then be used to assess that person’s cognitive condition.

As technology evolves, the eyes will prove more and more useful as a means of diagnosing all kinds of diseases and conditions because, by being transparent, the eye requires far less invasive methods of examination than other body parts.

But even without technology, it is possible to detect a number of health problems simply by looking at the eyes. Here are some of the warning signs.