Abstract

Purpose: To determine the causes of visual impairment in patients attending outreach services in Gandaki, Nepal.

Methods: This was a prospective cross sectional study conducted within two districts of Gandaki Zone Nepal. The patients forty years and above and attending the screening outreaches conducted by Himalaya Eye Hospital (HEH) were taken for the study. The patients attending the screening outreach underwent a thorough eye examination by an Ophthalmologist and an ophthalmic assistant. For the purpose of the study we only considered the distance and near visual acuity and the diagnoses. Distance visual impairment (DVI) was categorized as the presenting visual acuity of worse than 6/18 to 3/60 in the better eye. Blindness was categorized as the visual acuity of worse than 3/60 in the better eye. For all subjects the near visual impairment (NVI) was categorized as the presenting near vision of worse than N8 at patient’s preferred reading distance. The main cause of distance visual impairment or blindness was considered the main diagnosis.

Results: Eight hundred sixty two subjects within age group forty and above were taken for the study. The mean age of the study subjects was 64.75 ± 10.65. The odds ratio of having DVI in persons aged 60 years and older compared to those aged less than 60 years was 4.79 (CI: 2.94 to 7.83; p < 0.0001). The odds ratio of having DVI among illiterates compared to those who were literates was 2.77 (CI: 1.96 to 3.92; p < 0.0001). The odds ratio of having DVI among widowed individuals compared to married or single individuals was 2.86 (CI: 1.44 to 5.63; p = 0.002). 818 (94.9%) of the study population had NVI. The proportion of subjects who had NVI differed significantly between the occupations χ2 (3, N = 861) = 14.37, p = .006. Cataract was the main cause of DVI (56.47%) followed by Age Related Macular Degeneration (ARMD) (15.29%), refractive error (12.35%), and others (7.06%).

Conclusion: These data indicate that DVI and NVI is common in elderly population in Gandaki zone. The DVI and NVI are specifically dependent on the age, education level, occupation and marital status of the elderly people. Considering these factors as the determinants of vision loss, more focus on eye care services need to be provided to the population within these categories.

Keywords: Elderly; Outreach; Visual Impairment; Blindness; Morbidities

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Citation

Citation: Pawan Baral., et al. “Ocular Morbidities among the Elderly Attending Outreach Eye Care Clinics in Gandaki Zone, Nepal". Acta Scientific Ophthalmology 3.10 (2020): 40-46.

Copyright

Copyright: © 2020 Pawan Baral., et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.