October 19th, 2006
By Sarah Bruryn Jones
Inside a pitch-black room, about 15 preschoolers at University Place Elementary Schoolsat patiently waiting to have their picture taken.
The only light visible in the room was the flickering of red dots on the camera.
“Show me your surprise eyes,” said Skye Stewart, operating the camera. “Sit real still and show me your big eyes.” A bright white flash went off, temporarily illuminating the child being photographed. “Good,” Stewart said.
The specialized camera takes photos of the children’s eyes. Stewart is the Tuscaloosa coordinator for the FocusFirst program, a program of the non-profit Impact Alabama.
Impact works with higher education institutions, includingUniversityofAlabama, and surrounding communities on social justice projects throughout the state.
FocusFirst has set a goal of checking every low-income, underprivileged child between 15 months and 5 years old inAlabamafor potential eye and vision problems.
Lack of early eye exams is not just a problem among low-income children. According to the American Optometric Association, 14 percent of children younger than 6 are likely to have had an eye and vision examination. In other words, most parents wait until their children are enrolled in school.
Studies have shown, and experts agree, that the earlier a child’s eye or vision problem is caught, the better the chances are for preventing long-term problems.
FocusFirst is not the only program emphasizing early detection of eye problems in children. The American Public Health Association encourages regular eye examinations at the ages of 6 months, 2 years, and 4 years, and urges pediatricians to recommend that all children receive eye examinations at these intervals.
The American Optometric Association has made a recent push to encourage parents to get children screened even younger. Through the AOA’s InfantSEE program, optometrists provide free screenings to children between 6 months and 1 year old.
The program is in its second year. A search of the database of participating doctors at infantsee.org, showed five participate in Tuscaloosa.
FocusFirst costs about $80,000 annually and is entering its third year. In the first two years, the program screened more than 12,000 students, and vision problems were detected in about 11 percent of the children. Cost for the program is kept down because college student volunteers are trained to help administer tests.
“The bottom line is children in public schools when older are screened inAlabama,” said Stephen Black, president and founder of ImpactAlabama. “Everyone agrees it’s much more valuable to screen children before they start school, before they’ve fallen behind in reading, have behavioral issues or develop more serious [vision] problems.”
Lynn Hamonds, a Birmingham optometrist on the national committee developing the InfantSEE program, said the main goal of InfantSEE is to catch children with amblyopia, or lazy eye, early.
“What we know, based on research, is early intervention produces the best outcomes,” Hamonds said, adding that AOA would like early eye exams to be part of the regular well-baby checkups.
In children with lazy eye, one eye develops more than the other meaning vision in the weaker eye is reduced, because the brain and the eye are not working together properly. The eye looks normal, but it is not being used normally, because the brain is favoring the other eye.
The condition affects approximately 2 to 3 percent of children. Unless it is successfully treated in early childhood, amblyopia usually persists into adulthood, and is the most common cause of singleeye visual impairment among children and young and middle-aged adults. If left untreated, it can result in blindness in the lazy eye.
While lazy eye is the leading concern, the InfantSEE progam does a complete exam, looking for other eye-related problems.
FocusFirst, while not a complete exam, is used to detect irregularities. Experts at Vision Research Corp. analyze the photographs of the eyes for potential disorders, including ambylopia. When a problem is detected, follow-up care is provided through Sight Savers of Alabama, another non-profit organization that provides complete vision care for economically disadvantaged children.
