Intermittent atropine penalization improves vision in some children with amblyopia

Issue: January 25, 2018

Younger age and poorer best corrected visual acuity were associated with improved vision in children with amblyopia who underwent intermittent atropine penalization after failure of patch therapy.

In a retrospective observational study at Seoul National University Hospital, researchers reviewed records of 41 children who received 1% atropine twice a week for 4 months in their sound eye.

Treatment was successful in 21 patients (51.2%), which was defined as “final BCVA improvement of two logMAR lines relative to the baseline BCVA at the start of atropine penalization in the amblyopic eye.”

Mean age in the success group was 5.10 years and was 6.05 years in the failure group, a statistically significant difference (P = .044). Median BCVA in the success group of amblyopic eyes was 0.5 logMAR before treatment and was 0.3 logMAR in the failure group, yielding a statistically significant worse pretreatment BCVA in the success group (P = .001).

There were no significant differences in causes of amblyopia or in reasons for patch failure.

“Given the fact that a significant portion of patients showed treatment success with a relatively short-duration intermittent treatment, clinicians should attempt intermittent atropine penalization in cases in which patch therapy has failed,” the study authors wrote. – by Rebecca L. Forand

Disclosure: The authors report no relevant financial disclosures.

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Source:

Seol B, et al. J Pediatr Ophthalmol Strabismus. 2017;doi:10.3928/01913913-20170329-02.