Lazy eye cured by eyedrops

A study conducted by Dr. Michael Repka, a pediatric ophthalmologist at Johns Hopkins University shows that medicated eye drops can be just as effective as an eye patch in curing amblyopia, or lazy eye. The eye drops will also be much easier on the child because they do not carry with them the social problems created by making a child wear a patch over their eye.

Traditionally, a lazy eye is treated by covering the good eye with a patch, to make the lazy eye work harder and strengthen. Alternatively, doctors can opt to use atropine drops, which are placed in the good eye, causing its vision to be blurred. This forces the lazy eye to work harder to pick up some of the burden of vision, resulting in a strengthening of the lazy eye. The goal of the drops is to help evenly distribute the work of seeing between the two eyes so that they will align.

Repka said when he compared the traditional eye patch to treatment with atropine drops, the patch was effective in 79 percent of children and the drops were effective in 74 percent.

The eye drops are also more effective then the patch because children are more likely to use the drops because they will not be teased or made fun of by other children - problems that usually result in non-compliance when using the patch.

In an interview with United Press International, Repka said about three percent of American children have lazy eye, which usually is diagnosed during the pre-school years or during the early primary grades.

Despite the fact that only three percent of American children are afflicted with lazy eye, this condition constitutes the second leading cause of children's visits to the eye doctor, behind problems with near-sightedness.

The lazy eye is typically diagnosed due to misalignment of the pupils or eyes. This results from the fact that the lazy eye is not working, and forcing the good eye to take over. Thus the two eyes do not move in sync. Lazy eye can also be diagnosed by the inability to focus between the eyes.

"The patch is worn for all waking hours for a period that equates to one week for each year of life," said Repka. "So a 2-year-old is treated for two weeks and so on."

The patch is rarely successful in a single treatment regiment, and thus the child is often required to continue wearing it for an extended period of time.

Repka said ophthalmologists at Johns Hopkins Wilmer Eye Institute in Baltimore have been using atropine drops as alternative for the past 20 years.

417 children participated in the study across 47 clinical centers. 202 children were randomly assigned to treatment with atropine, while 215 were treated with eye patches. Repke reported that after a 6 month period the quality of the improvement of the children's vision "were clinically the same in the two groups."

Don Everett, a program director for collaborative clinical studies at NEI said the results of the new study suggest it can be safely used as a clinical alternative to eye patches.

That's important, he added, because "what happens most times is that the child leaves the house with the patch on, but when he or she gets on the school bus the patch either comes off or is switched to the lazy eye."

Everett further praised the benefits of the eye drops by highlighting the fact that, "a parent puts in the drops and the drops are there to stay for the rest of the day."

Everett said drops also are cheaper than patches. "Atropine has been around for a long time so it's pretty cheap. Treating amblyopia with atropine costs about $10 compared to $100 for the patches," he said.