Changing pattern of retinopathy of prematurity: a 37-year clinic experience.

A retrospective analysis was done of multi-disciplinary neurodevelopmental assessments in 70 children who were legally blind because of cicatricial retinopathy of prematurity. The subjects lived in British Columbia and were born during a 37-year period between 1951 and 1987. The purpose of the study was to investigate changes in the perinatal characteristics and to evaluate the associated handicaps. All patients were assessed at least once in the Visually Impaired Program, British Columbia Children's Hospital. In the majority, the visual loss was profound. Since 1951, blinding retinopathy of prematurity has become a disease of progressively smaller and less mature infants. Since 1981, it has been almost entirely confined to infants of birth weight less than 1,000 g in British Columbia. The diagnosis of mild spastic diplegia was made more commonly in patients born after 1980 but, despite the progressive reduction in birth weight and gestational age during the study period, the number of patients without other associated handicaps remained constant (approximately 30%) during each successive decade.