Experts say that there is a need for preschool visual assessment in order to identify children with eye and vision problems before the primary school entry so that they may benefit from early intervention to correct or improve vision.
In a pilot study, researchers found that eye and vision problems in 6.3 per cent of preschool children and the most common eye problem was refractive error (3.9 per cent), followed by allergic conjunctivitis (1.3 per cent). Others include strabismus (0.9 per cent) and congenital cataract (0.4 per cent).
The study, to provide logistics for introducing preschool eye screening in Nigeria, selected 560 children from a total of 9,944 children aged three to five years attending nursery schools in Ijebu North Local Government Area. Demographic and other relevant data were collected from the children and they also underwent full eye evaluation.
According to the study, 35 children (6.3 per cent) out of the 560 participants had diseases that can affect the eye and eye health in one or both eyes; representing 61 eyes (5.4 per cent) out of the 1120 eyes examined. Ninety-six eye disorders were identified in these 61 eyes because some of these eyes had multiple problems.
The 2021 study, in the Middle East African Journal of Ophthalmology, said eye and vision problems were identified in 6.5 per cent of 3-year-old participants, 7.1 per cent of 4-year-old participants, and 5.3 per cent of 5-year-old participants, respectively.
Simple myopia was the most common type of refractive error, accounting for 50 per cent of the identified refractive errors. Astigmatism accounted for 36.4 per cent of the refractive errors. Also, myopia was found as the major type of uncorrected refractive error in this study followed by astigmatism.
The researchers said that since a refractive error is treatable, greater attention needs to be paid to the refractive needs of the preschool children and Nigeria as a whole to prevent interference with the learning skills of young children entering school and to prevent permanent visual impairment from amblyopia.
According to them, regular and periodical vision screening at preschool entry would assist in early detection of uncorrected refractive error even as vernal conjunctivitis/allergic conjunctivitis also need close attention.
They said that severe form of eye allergy with cornea involvement, if not managed appropriately, can lead to childhood blindness as seen in the case of left blind eye from vernal conjunctivitis in this study.
They concluded “preschool screening with basic eye examination is feasible in our environment and can help in the early detection of eye and vision problems, especially the risk factors for amblyopia such as uncorrected refractive error. Greater attention needs to be paid to the refractive needs of these children to prevent interference with their learning skills and also to prevent permanent blindness from amblyopia.”
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