Untreatable monocular blindness in pakistani eye patients

ABSTRACT

To determine the incidence of untreatable [at least by means currently available in Pakistan] monocular blindness in our hospital-based population, we examined 1,710 consective patients admitted to the Department of Ophthamology, Lady Reading Hospital, Postgraduate Medical Institute, Peshawar from September 17, 1990 to January 1991. Seven percent [235] of the patients had monocular blindness with visual acuity of 3/60 [10/200] or less in the affected eye. Out of these 235 patients, visual loss in 94 [40%] was due to trauma, in 51 [21.7%] due to corneal opacification from various corneal diseases, in 41 [71.4%] due to end-stage glaucoma [33 with primary glaucoma and eight with secondary glaucoma], in 15 [6.3%] from postoperative infection following cataract surgery, in 14 [5.9%] due to optic atrophy, and in the remainder 20 [8.5%] due to miscellanous causes, including retinoblastoma [four cases], retinal detachment [three cases], panophthalmitis [two cases], spontaneous rupture of an anterior staphyloma [two cases], basal cell carcinoma of eyelid invading the orbit [two cases], squamous cell carcinoma of conjunctiva involving globe [two cases], microphthamos, proptosis complications, explusive choroidal hemorrhage during cataract extraction, myopic degeneration, and diabetic retinopathy [one case each]. That only one patient had visual loss due to diabetic retinopathy is interesting. The overall incidence of monocular blindness in Pakistan can be significantly reduced by adequate and timely preventive and therapeutic measures against ocular trauma and corneal disease, the two leading causes of blindness. The recent heavy influx of the Afghan refugees of Russian aggression of their country might increased the incidence of trauma in our area. [Pakistan Journal of Ophthalmology 83-5, January, 1992]