ABSTRACT
Background: Uncorrected refractive errors (RE) are a major cause of visual impairment. They affect a large proportion of the population globally and have psychological and socio-economic effects on the individual, family and society. They could lead to poor quality of life.Aim: To determine the pattern and predisposing factors of refractive errors among patients seen in the outpatient clinic.Methodology: A cross-sectional, descriptive study involving patients with refractive error that presented to the eye clinic in the year 2017. Data were obtained from patients’ records, entered into and analysed using IBM SPSS version 25.Results: A total of 300 patients with refractive errors were seen in the period of study. This comprised of 93 males and 207 females with mean age of 40.13±17.6 years. The commonest presenting complaint was blurring of both far & near vision (24%), other presenting complaints in decreasing order of frequency were blurring of distant vision, itching, blurring of near vision, eye pain, headache and red eyes in 18%,15%, 9.6%, 5.6%, and 3.2% respectively. Presbyopia was noted in 55.3% while myopia, anisometropia, astigmatism and hypermetropia were noted in 20.7%, 19.3%, 7.0% and 1.3% respectively. Nuclear sclerosis was the commonest co-existing ocular pathology or morbidity.Statistically significant association was found between age of the patients and presence of ocular disease existing with RE (p=0.016).Conclusion: Fifty-one percent of the study population had refractive errors. The commonest refractive error was myopia while hypermetropia was the least common refractive error in this environment.
ABSTRACT
Aim: To assess the practice of trabeculectomy among ophthalmologists in Nigeria. Materials and Methods: This was a cross-sectional study in which structured, self- administered questionnaires were distributed to 80 consenting ophthalmologists present during the 2010 annual scientific session of the Ophthalmological Society of Nigeria. All consenting ophthalmologists treat glaucoma patients. Information obtained were demographic characteristics, glaucoma outpatient load, number of trabeculectomies performed in the preceding 1 year and during residency training, and factors influencing trabeculectomy practice. Data were analyzed with Statistical Package for Social Science version 16.0. Relationships between variables were tested using the Χ2 test for statistical significance. Results: Sixty-five of the 80 consenting ophthalmologists responded to the questionnaires (81.3% response rate); 32 (53.3%) were females and 28 (46.7%) were males (5 non-responders). Ages ranged from 30 to 60 years with a mean of 44 years ± SD 7.7. Only 36 (57.1%) performed trabeculectomy in the 1 year preceding the study. There was an overall trabeculectomy rate of 0.9/ophthalmologist/month. Of the 15 respondents who performed more than 15 trabeculectomies during residency, 14 (93.3%) also performed the surgery in the year preceding this study (P = 0.001). The main limitation to the practice of the procedure was patients' unwillingness to accept surgery, as identified by 50 (89.3%) respondents. Conclusions: A low trabeculectomy rate of 0.9/ophthalmologist/month was found in this study. It was significantly associated with insufficient exposure to the surgery during residency training and patients' poor acceptance of the surgery