What parents should know about the necessity of frequent eye checkups for childrens

What parents should know about the necessity of frequent eye checkups for children?

As parents, watching over a child’s health is one of the important tasks. As parents navigate challenges in nutrition, physical activity, and the changes their body goes through during growth, it is important to keep track of all the many milestones they reach. ensuring that they can enjoy good eyesight is a part of these efforts. most recommendations state that children should have an eye examination within the first year of their life and again once a year after the child enters school.

Eye examination by a certified Ophthalmologist for every child is important to ensure that the child’s eyes are healthy and have no vision problems or any ocular disease that could affect the eyes and the safety of the child. If any child is suffering from diminution of vision/ frequent rubbing of eyes/ excessive blinking/ squinting/ half shutting of eyes/failure to maintain eye contact/ any misalignment of eyes/ inability to maintain gaze or fixation while looking at an object, the parent should promptly get the child to ophthalmologist and get treated adequately. If the child is having any of these above-mentioned problems, failure to do early detection and treatment of the condition adequately during the formative years of the child’s life will have a negative impact on the child’s academic as well as psychological growth. Children seated near the back of the class may face a fall in their grades until they receive glasses and can read the blackboard clearly.

Also, few children might be suffering from conditions like color vision deficiency or congenital ocular anomalies where the prognosis might be poor. In such cases, parents, as well as the child, should be counseled early in life so that they can choose their future career paths accordingly rather than getting disappointed later in life. Hence it is crucial for parents to be aware of their child’s vision status and take necessary precautions and adequate treatment wherever it is needed so that the child will grow to its full potential and become an asset to society.

Dr. Chethana Warad
Consultant
M.S ( Ophthalmology)
Ophthalmology