Dr.Aruna Rathakrishna

Abstract

Aim: To explore the need to checkfor exceptional vision among school children in Southern India

Methods:Unaided Visual acuity testing was conducted in an urban school by optometrists using 3 MeterLogMARchartusingLine scoring method. The children were encouraged to read through the entire chart.

Result: A total of 292 children (54.6% male) in their teens- aged 13.1±1.8, ranging from 11 to 17 were evaluated.249 (42.9%) eyes had unaided VA>0.0.Nearly one third (32.2%) of the teenagers had Unaided VA>0.0 in the worse eye (bilateral) and 54.5% in the better eye. VA in the worse eye>0.0 to -0.1 was observed in 63(21.6%), up to -0.2 in 27(9.2%) and lower than -0.2 in 4 (1.4%) students. Among these students, mean VA was -0.12±0.04 (min -0.28). Laterality of exceptional vision was not statistically significantly different between gender (p-0.078).

Conclusion: Routinescreening for exceptional vision in formative years could navigate teenagers towards vision specific professions.