Factors Associated With spectacle-wear compliance among hypermetropic pre-school children in Al-diwaniya Governorate, Iraq

Abstract

Background: Uncorrected refractive error are community health problem among pre-school children. It's also considered as the most common cause of avoidable visual impairment in children worldwide. Objective: This study intended to measure the extent of compliance of hypermetropic preschool children with spectacle wear and the factors connected with non-compliance.
Method: The study was carried out in my ophthalmology private clinic. One hundred and fourteen patients (114 patients) below 6 years old were enrolled this study. Each was interviewed by the author of correspondence. the possible factors associated with non-compliance with spectacle wear were identified.
Results: The total number of patients enrolled in this study was 114 among them 36% were compliance with spectacle wear while 73% were non compliance. The results also revealed that children less than 2 years were 12 and 35 in compliant and non compliant respectively. For gender distribution, there were 15 male and 26 female in complaint children while there were 39 male and 34 female in those who non complaint. Urban children showed high compliant for spectacle wear than rural one.
Conclusion: One of the risk factor for noncompliance with in the present study were region distribution and ignorance by family. More population based studies with larger sample should be conducted to assess the determinants of the spectacle use and the barriers to spectacle use should be addressed.