A survey of the Prevalence of Refractive Errors among Children in Lower Primary School in Kampla District.

dc.contributor.author Mayeku, Robert
dc.date.accessioned 2013-07-02T11:31:23Z
dc.date.available 2013-07-02T11:31:23Z
dc.date.issued 2001
dc.description A Dissertation for submission to the Faculty of Medicine in partial fulfillment for the Award of a degree of Masters of Medicine (Ophthalmology) of Makerere University. en_US
dc.description.abstract BACKGROUND: The prevalence of refractive errors in children in most developing countries is not known. WHO has initiated the refractive error study in children (RESC) program to try and address this problem in the vision 2020. The right to sight. In Uganda, like in many developing countries there is almost no established vision screening program for children on commencement of primary school, such that those with early onset of refractive errors will have many years of poor vision. THE AIMS AND OBJECTIVES of this study was to determine the prevalence of refractive errors among school children attending lower primary in Kampala district, determine the frequency of the various types of refractive errors and their relationship to sex and ethnicity. METHODOLOGY: This descriptive cross sectional study was carried out in Kampala district and a multi stage type of sampling was used to select the 700 participants aged between 6 and 9 years. A total of 623 children of them had a vision testing done on them at school using the same protocol. Of this 301 (48.3%) were males and 322 (51.7%) females – M: F ratio of approximately 1:1. Seventy five children had a detailed ocular examination including retinoscopy under cyclopegia and fundoscopy according to the set criteria of a visual acuity of < 6/9 and / or a squint in either or both eyes. RESULTS: There were 73 children with refractive errors, giving a prevalence rate of 11.6%. The 2 children who were emmetropic at retinoscopy had fundus abnormalities. Of the refractive errors, the commonest type was astigmatism constituting 52.0% followed by hypermetropia and myopia (37.0% and 11.o% respectively). On further analysis of the astigmatic type it was found that the commonest component was the hypermetropic subtype accounting for 42.1% followed by the mixed (31.6%) and myopic (26.3%). There was no significant sex and ethnic influence in the frequency and distribution of refractive errors in this study. CONCLUSION: From this study, there is a need to have a regular and simple vision testing in school children at least at commencement of school to detect those who may have early onset of refractive errors for referral. This needs a wider population based survey top establish the national figures for prevalence of refractive errors, covering wider age strata, in view of creating a national program for vision screening in schools. en_US
dc.identifier.uri http://hdl.handle.net/10570/1496
dc.language.iso en en_US
dc.subject Refractive Errors, en_US
dc.subject Children, en_US
dc.subject Primary school, en_US
dc.subject Kampala District, en_US
dc.subject Developing Countries, en_US
dc.subject WHO, en_US
dc.subject Vision, en_US
dc.subject Screening, en_US
dc.subject Frequency, en_US
dc.subject Sex, en_US
dc.subject Ethnicity, en_US
dc.subject Emmetropic, en_US
dc.subject Retinoscopy, en_US
dc.subject Cycloplegia, en_US
dc.subject Ocular, en_US
dc.subject Fundoscopy, en_US
dc.subject Visual Acuity, en_US
dc.subject Astigmatism, en_US
dc.subject Hypermetropia, en_US
dc.subject Myopia, en_US
dc.subject Regular, en_US
dc.subject Strata. en_US
dc.title A survey of the Prevalence of Refractive Errors among Children in Lower Primary School in Kampla District. en_US
dc.type Thesis, masters en_US
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