Astigmatism in Children with Epiblepharon

Sohn, Sae Woon; Woo, Kyung In; Chang, Hae Ran

Abstract

PURPOSE: To compare the prevalance and the amount of astigmatism between the epiblepharon patients who had been operated epiblepharon and normal school children.
METHODS
The noncycloplegic refraction using autorefractor was performed in 120 epiblepharon patients from Jan. 1997 to June 2000. Astigmatism in excess of 0.5 D was studied. We compared the findings of epiblephron patients and 443 normal school children in Seoul.
RESULTS
The prevalence of astigmatism was 72.9% in epiblephron group and 41.6% in normal children group, and the difference was statistically significant (P< 0.001). The amount of astigmatism was 1.52 D and 0.73 D in each group, and the difference was statistically significant (P< 0.001).The distribution of astigmatism showed 1.0 D or less in 22.5%, from above 1.0 D to 2.0 D or less in 26.3%, from above 2.0 D to 3.0 D or less in 10.8%, from above 3.0 D to 4.0 D or less in 9.6% and above 4.0 D in 3.8% in epiblepharon group and in normal children group 26.2%, 11.2%, 2.6%, 1.0%, and 0.7% respectively. The difference between both groups was statistically significant (P< 0.001). With-the-rule astigmaism was found in 77.9% and against-the-rule was 22.1% in epiblephron group and 72.8% and 27.2% respectively in normal children group.
CONCLUSIONS
The prevalence and the amount of astigmatism were higher in epiblepharon group than in normal children group. It might be caused by the increase of orbicularis muscle tone and the effect of skin fold overriding lid margin in epiblepharon patients.