Abstract
Purpose: :
To investigate parental refractive error and children’s refractive error at 1 year as risk factors for the development of myopia.
Methods: :
165 children with refractions at 1 year and 14/15 years and with refractions from both parents were included in this analysis. The infants were refracted in the laboratory by non-cycloplegic near retinoscopy and the older children by non-cycloplegic distance retinoscopy. Parents were either refracted in the laboratory or their prescriptions were obtained from their eye care providers. Myopes were defined as having a spherical equivalent refraction < -0.50 D. The effect of 1-year refraction on myopic development as well as its impact stratified by the number of myopic parents was evaluated by an odds ratio.
Results: :
The mean refraction at 1 year was 0.92D+/-0.84D. The mean Rx at 14/15 years was -0.54 D +/- 1.64D and 35% (58/165) were myopic. For children with an Rx at 1 year <1.0D, a higher proportion were myopic at age 14/15 years than for those with an Rx ≥ 1.0D at 1 year (39/92 = 42.4% versus 19/73 = 26.0%, OR=2.94, 95% CI: (1.07, 4.07)). For children with 0/1 myopic parent, there was a significant difference in the prevalence of myopia at 14/15 years by 1-year refraction, with more myopic children in the 1-year lower Rx group compared to the higher Rx group (24/61=39.3% vs. 8/53=15.1%, OR=3.65, CI (1.47, 9.07)), while the myopia prevalence difference by infancy refraction was not found for children with 2 myopic parents (15/31=48.4% vs.11/20=55%, OR=0.767, CI (0.25, 2.37)).
Conclusions: :
For children with 0/1 myopic parent, having a negative or low positive refraction at 1 year increases the risk of being myopic at 14/15 years. However, for children with 2 myopic parents, the infancy refraction does not appear to make a difference in whether they become myopic by age 15 years.
Keywords: refraction • refractive error development • clinical (human) or epidemiologic studies: prevalence/incidence