Spectacles

Is it necessary to wear spectacles?
he/she is so small to use spectacles!
will the spectacles power decrease with constant use of spectacles?
he will get injured with spectacles on while playing!
exercises being offered to get rid of spectacles?

Probably these are the most common questions and misconceptions that parents have. Let’s clear them one by one, vitreo-retina surgeon in kolkata. If the child is having a significant refractive error, it is must for him to use the spectacles as soon as it is prescribed.

Duration of spectacle use in children – definitely full waking hours. Children have to accumulate knowledge from their surroundings apart from their books. So they need to have good vision throughout the day – which will come only with spectacles if they have refractive error. Secondly – if error is high, retina surgeon in Kolkata they will end with permanent visual impairment due to lazy eye if they don’t use spectacles.

Squint

Myth – squint is only a cosmetic problem and can be corrected at any age. This statement is totally false. Squint is not just a cosmetic problem – it can lead to lazy eye. Even when the vision is good, presence of squint may lead to loss of depth perception and three dimensional vision. Just to assess how your child may be seeing in the presence of squint, close one of your eyes and see your surroundings.

Then open both your eyes and see – you will notice the difference. This difference can be restored only when squint is corrected at appropriate time. That appropriate time may be as early as one year of age depending on the type of squint.

Squint can be corrected either by surgery or spectacles – has to be done at a proper time when benefit would be maximum, retina surgeon in Kolkata. Eyes can be aligned later on also, but the benefit would be only cosmetic alignment, not functional improvement.

Injury

We have to be very careful to make home and school environment child friendly to avoid injury in children.

Maximum injuries in urban society occurs at home or school. In rural areas, it is more during unmonitored outdoor games and playing with dangerous items like needle or stick and vitreo-retina surgeon in Kolkata.

Amblyopia

Commonly known as lazy eye. Common causes are squint, refractive error and unequal power in the two eyes. The most common form of treatment is spectacle power AND patching of the better eye.

Any one of the two components of treatment missing would not help. Another important point here is that the benefit from patching is faster if done at a younger age, retina surgeon in Kolkata. So once amblyopia is diagnosed, then patching has to be started immediately as advised, and cannot be missed even for a day.

Cataract in children

Is an emergency. Adults would regain the same vision even if operated late, but children would lose the chances of visual recovery if surgery is delayed. And it has to be done by surgeons having training in Pediatric Cataract surgery.

The surgery is technically more difficult than adult cataract surgery. If not done properly it may cause more harm than good.

Premature children

Who are born on or before 32 weeks of gestation or with birth weight of less than 2.5 kg have the risk of developing a condition called retinopathy of prematurity. The risk increases if the infant experienced a stormy neonatal period with admission to NICU and exposure to oxygen therapy.

These children MUST have a detailed retina checkup and treated early with laser if required. Again this has to be done by trained pediatric ophthalmologist or a retina surgeon, as this checkup also requires some extra skill.

Watering in infants

Many children experience watering and discharge from one or both eyes during infancy. It is generally due to incomplete canalization of what is called nasolacrimal duct. This is a tube which connects the conjunctival sac to the nose and drains the tear from eyes to nose. In some infants the nasal end of the tube remains blocked and causes watering and discharge.

The solution is simple – massage over lacrimal sac area with pressure being transmitted downwards, retina surgeon in Kolkata. With proper technique and frequency there is a very high chance of it getting resolved without any surgical intervention like probing under general anesthesia.

Eye allergy in children

It is another very common problem in children. It occurs in children due to exposure to external allergens, and not by any food. Many times steroid eye drops are required to control the allergy.

Since it is a recurrent, parents do get tempted to use these drops without advice of the doctors. We have to understand that steroid eye drops are like double edged sword – can cause severe side effects if used unmonitored, retina surgeon in Kolkata.

So please don’t self-medicate with steroid eye drops for allergy. Information about allergy which would be useful for parents – it would tend to recur in children prone to it up to about 15-16 years of age. Till then it has to be with combination of drops in dose which would minimize the side effects.