ABSTRACT
AIM: To investigate the prevalence and the causes of childhood blindness and visual impairment in Poland. MATERIAL AND METHODS: The records of 3000 visually impaired children from the archives of Polish Association of Blinds and from the centers and schools for visually handicapped children from the years 1979-1999 have been reviewed. RESULTS: The number of the visually disabled children in Poland has increased by 70% in the recent 10 years. The main causes of blindness and serious visual loss in the years 1979-1999 are optic nerve atrophy (21.66%), retinopathy of prematurity (19.01%), cataracts (14.13%), high myopia (11.84%), congenital abnormalities (8.65%), retinal dystrophies (8.08%) and glaucoma (6.42%). Optic nerve atrophy occurred mainly in premature infants. There have been great changes in the epidemiology of blindness in the recent 20 years; the percentage of visually disabled children caused by ROP has increased from 8.1% to 54.5% and caused by optic nerve atrophy from 15.5% to 27.27%. The prevalence of other causes has decreased in the same time. CONCLUSION: The main activities required to control blindness in Poland are promotion of pregnancy and prematurity care and improvements in the early diagnosis and treatment of retinopathy of prematurity.
