Eye health care for Infants

Eye health care for Infants

It is the wish of all parents for their children to be healthy and live happy fulfilled lives. To achieve this they may go to any length to provide their children with the very best.

When a child is born, to give him or her a healthy future, the parents make sure that their child gets vaccinated on time, and may also go for regular checkups to assure that there is nothing wrong with their child’s health.

However one thing that is generally ignored in this regimen, is a child’s eye health. Due to which a child may suffer long before any kind of diagnosis is made regarding any problems with the eyes or vision. Until and unless the problem is acutely visible, parents generally ignore the fact that like any other health checkups, regular eye checkup should also be an essential part of a child’s healthcare routine.

The need is for the parents to be aware of the progress of an infants vision, the same way they are aware of other milestones in a child’s development. Milestones like their growth patterns, feeding progress, a child’s cognition development for example, when should a child walk and talk etc.

In the same way, it is equally important to keep an eye on the vision progress of an infant. From birth to twenty four months of age, regular checkups are required for early detection of any ailments or problems of the eyes and vision. However parents should also keep in mind the normal patterns of vision progress so as not to get alarmed without cause or concern.

From  birth to 4 months of age, eye hand coordination begins to develop as the infant starts focusing on moving objects with his or her eyes and reaching for them. In the first two months, an infants eyes may appear to wander or to be crossed. This is usually normal. However, if an eye appears to turn in and out constantly, an evaluation is warranted as that may develop into a squint.

From the age of 5 to 8 months, an infants eyes slowly become capable of working together to form a three-dimensional view of the world.

From 9 to 12 months, babies can start judging distances fairly well and throw things with precision.

By 2 years of age, a child’s eye-hand coordination and depth perception should be well developed.

Even though it is rare in infants to have vision or eye problems, and most babies begin life with healthy eyes, occasionally, eye health and vision problems can develop.

Following are the signs that parents need to look for that may indicate problems in eyes or vision:

-Excessive tearing in an infants eyes may indicate blocked tear duct.

-Encrusted or red eyelids could be sign of an eye infection. A large chalazion ( also known as sebaceous cyst) or an infection may need to be treated.

-If a parent detects extreme sensitivity to light in his or her child, it may be an indication of elevated pressure in the eyes.

-In very rare cases, if there is an appearance of a white pupil, it may indicate the presence of an eye cancer

-When the eyes of a child do not align properly, it results in a squint. While one eye focuses on one spot, the other eye can turns inwards, upwards, downwards or outwards. It can happen intermittently or all the time.

-Some children may have a condition called Amblyopia also commonly known as the lazy eye. In this condition the eye and brain cognition is weak due to which a child will develop good vision in one eye and poor in the other one. The most common concern regarding this ailment is that infants or children get used to using their ‘good eye’ and may not notice if there is anything wrong and so will not mention it to their parents. Only timely and regular checkups can diagnose this problem.

The most important question is, what can parents do to help their baby’s vision develop properly?

A few suggestions of activities that can assist an infant’s visual development are as follows:

From Birth to 4 months, keep reach-and-touch toys within the baby’s focus. Also, change the crib’s position frequently, talk to the baby as the parent walks around the room and alternate right and left sides while feeding so that the baby learns to adjust his or her eyes accordingly.

From 5 to 8 month, hang a mobile, crib gym or various objects across the crib for the baby to grab and pull. Give the baby plenty of time to play and explore on the floor.

During the age of 9 to 12 months, the game of hide and seek can be played with toys or face to help the baby develop visual memory. Objects can be named out loud while talking to the baby to encourage the baby’s word association and vocabulary.

From the ages of one to two years the child can be engaged in games like rolling the ball back and forth so that he or she can track objects with the eyes visually. Also stories can be read or told to stimulate the child’s ability to visualise and pave the way for learning and reading skills.

Most importantly, even if no eye or vision problems are apparent, even then, at about the age of 6 months, a baby should be taken to the doctor of optometry for his or her first thorough eye examination, followed by a check up every six months. This will help the doctor to rule out the following eye or vision problems after a complete check up;

-excessive or unequal amount of near or farsightedness and/or astigmatism

-eye movement ability of the child.   And

-eye health and vision disorders

Amanat Eye Hospital branches across Pakistan are known to be the best at providing the latest treatments available and state of the art technology to provide eye health solutions. We have got ophthalmology specialists and staff to provide the most advanced diagnostic consultations and medical and surgical management of children’s eye and vision disorders. Our full and part time clinical faculty members understand the needs of caring for infants and children and their families, and have expertise in a range of areas from strabismus (Abnormal alignment of one or both eyes also known as a squint) surgery to paediatric neuro-ophthalmology, retinopathy of prematurity, vision screening and amblyopia (visual defect or impairment) treatment.

We are also very pleased to inform the readers that Pakistan’s best Squint specialist and paediatric ophthalmologist, Prof Dr Mubashar Jalis is providing his services at Amanat Eye Hospital Rawalpindi and Islamabad.

For further information regarding the child eye and vision care services, please visit our website www.amanathospital.com