Premature birth remains high risk factor for ophthalmic complications

A long-term Finnish study has found infants born weighing less than 1,500 g have a high incidence of blindness as well as other ophthalmic complications, including retinopathy of prematurity, optic atrophy and cerebral amblyopia.

Sirkka-Liisa Rudanko, MD, and colleagues with the Finnish Register of Visual Impairment analyzed records of 556 visually impaired children who had been born at fewer than 37 gestational weeks in Finland between 1972 and 1989. Among the main outcome measures were visual acuity and ophthalmic diagnoses.

Of the 556 children, 125 had been born preterm. Retinopathy of prematurity, optic atrophy and cerebral amblyopia were the main diagnoses associated with visual impairment. Of those children born prematurely with visual impairment, 66% were also affected by other handicaps, 54% by cerebral palsy and 36% by epilepsy. Of the 125 born preterm, 88 (70%) were blind. Very low birth weights and a gestational age of less than 30 weeks were associated with an increased risk of visual impairment.

The study is published in the August issue of Ophthalmology.