Abstract
Purpose: :
Describe the clinical characteristics and outcomes of children with Retinopathy of Prematurity (ROP) who were screened and treated in 6 Neonatal Intensive Care Units (NICUs) in the Northern Coast of Colombia between July 2003 and July 2009.
Design: :
Retrospective, Observational
Participants: :
856 eyes were examined in 428 premature infants with a high risk of developing ROP (242 male and 186 female).
Methods: :
856 eyes of 428 infants born with gestational age (GA) of 32 weeks or less and a birth weight (BW) of 1500 g. or less (242 male and 186 female) were examined by one physician.
Results: :
233 of 428 (54.4%) patients had any type of ROP, affecting 466 eyes. ROP was bilateral in 418 patients (97.6%) and unilateral in 10 patients (2.4%). The mean of GA of the neonates with any ROP was 29.8 weeks. More than 50% of the cases were infants born between 27 and 29 weeks. 86% of the patients with ROP were born before week 32 (p=0.005). The mean BW of our study group was 1230 grs. 406/468 (86%) of the infants with ROP had BW of 1500 g. or less. 228/468 (48.7%) had a BW between 1000 and 1500 g. and 169/468 (36.1%) had a BW of 1000 g or less. 257/856 (30%) eyes developed treatable ROP. 142/856 eyes (16.5%) achieved threshold and 115/856 eyes (13.4%) type 1 pre-threshold ROP. Out of the 856 eyes screened, 257 eyes (30%) received laser treatment
Conclusions: :
The development of ROP in our cohort is related to low GE (<32 weeks) and low BW (<1500 g), however, not all babies followed this trend. In our study, 54.4% of the infants that develop ROP were between 1000 and 1500 g. and 14% with ROP were born after week 32. Our population had a relatively high incidence of developing treatable ROP (threshold or Type 1). Thus, we advocate that each institution carefully monitor their trends and rates of ROP in order to develop screening criteria that will capture the greatest number of neonates with ROP.
Keywords: retinopathy of prematurity