THURSDAY, June 1 (HealthDay News) -- About three-quarters of children with fully accommodative esotropia and low levels of hypermetropia are able to stop wearing glasses after hyperopic correction, according to a study in the May issue of the American Journal of Ophthalmology.
Deniz Somer, M.D., and colleagues from the SB Ankara Education and Research Hospital in Turkey, studied the effect of reducing hyperopic corrections by 0.50 diopter increments on binocular accommodative responses in 31 children with fully accommodative esotropia and a baseline refractive error of +1.50 to +5.0 diopters. Thirteen children had a baseline hyperopic correction of 3.0 or less (group 1) and 18 had a baseline hyperopic correction of greater than 3.0 (group 2).
Reducing the correction by 2.0 diopters in group 1 and by 1.0 diopter in group 2 initially decreased the accommodative response in the nondominant eye, followed by the dominant eye after a further 0.50 diopter reduction. Overcoming the bilateral accommodative lag required a 0.50 diopter stronger hyperopic correction. The group 1 patients were able to tolerate a mean undercorrection of 2.37 diopters and 77 percent no longer required glasses. In contrast, group 2 patients were still dependent on glasses, although the correction was a median of -1.67 diopters less than their full cycloplegic refraction.
The study may "further work in this mundane but significant threat to our children's visual system," states an accompanying editorial.
Abstract
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Editorial
