[The causes of childhood blindness and visual impairment in Poland].

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.