Risk Factors Associated with the Recurrence of Amblyopia after Successful Treatment

Hwa Rang Lim; Dae Hyun Kim

doi:10.3341/jkos.2020.61.1.86

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Lim and Kim: Risk Factors Associated with the Recurrence of Amblyopia after Successful Treatment

Original Article

Journal of the Korean Ophthalmological Society 2020; 61(1): 86-91.

Published online: 15 January 2020

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3341/jkos.2020.61.1.86

Risk Factors Associated with the Recurrence of Amblyopia after Successful Treatment

Hwa Rang Lim, MD, Dae Hyun Kim, MD, PhD

Department of Ophthalmology, Chosun University College of Medicine, Gwangju, Korea.

Address reprint requests to Dae Hyun Kim, MD, PhD. Department of Ophthalmology, Chosun University Hospital, #365 Pilmun-daero, Dong-gu, Gwangju 61453, Korea. Tel: 82-62-220-3190, Fax: 82-62-225-9839, eyelovehyun@hanmail.net

Received 13 June 2019 Revised 26 September 2019 Accepted 30 December 2019

The Korean Ophthalmological Society

(open-access):

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

Purpose

We sought factors affecting amblyopia recurrence after successful treatment.

Methods

We included 117 patients with amblyopia. Patients were divided into recurrence and non-recurrence groups. We analyzed sex, age, amblyopia type, treatment duration, visual acuity, and binocular status.

Results

Of the 117 patients, 25 (21.4%) experienced recurrences. In that group, 60.0% of patients (compared to 14.1% of the no-recurrence group) exhibited high-frequency strabismus (p < 0.001). The recurrence group were younger than the no-recurrence group at both the beginning and end of treatment (p < 0.05). None of visual acuity at treatment commencement or end, stereoacuity, or suppression affected amblyopia recurrence.

Conclusions

Recurrent amblyopia is frequent after initial successful treatment if the patient exhibits strabismus or is young.

Keywords: Amblyopia, Recurrence, Risk factors

Figures and Tables

Figure 1

Comparison of recurrence patients according to the patient age. (A) Higher recurrence rate was observed in younger patients at start of treatment (p = 0.002^). (B) Higher recurrence rate was observed in younger patients at the end of treatment (p = 0.006^). ^*p-values by linear by linear association test.

Table 1

Risk factors associated with recurrent amblyopia in successfully treated amblyopia patients

Numeric variables are presented as mean ± standard deviation or number (%).

BCVA = best corrected visual acuity; logMAR = logarithm of the minimum angle of resolution.

^*Chi-square test; ^†student's t-test.

Table 2

Comparison of binocular status between recurrent and non-recurrent patients with amblyopia

Numeric variables are presented as number (%).

^*Chi-square test; ^†student's t-test.

Notes

This study was presented as a narration at the 121th Annual Meeting of the Korean Ophthalmological Society 2019.

This study was supported by research funds from Chosun University 2019.

^{Conflicts of Interest} The authors have no conflicts to disclose.

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