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What it is:
Amblyopia (am-blee-OH-pee-ah) is also called "lazy eye." It means that the eye did not develop normal sight during childhood. Usually, one eye is strong and one eye is weak ("lazy").
What You Need To Do:
Have your child's vision checked by age four. The eye exam should be performed by a pediatrician, family physician, or ophthalmologist (Eye M.D.).
Why It’s Important:
Early detection (before age 9) is essential to successful treatment. Both eyes need to have normal vision to see depth, and in case something happens to one eye later in life, a good other eye is useful.
In-Depth Information:
| Symptoms | Treatment | Tests/Diagnosis | Causes/Risk Factors | All |
Symptoms
It is not easy to recognize amblyopia. A child may not be aware of having one strong eye and one weak eye. Unless the child has a misaligned eye or other obvious abnormality, there is often no way for parents to tell that something is wrong.
Amblyopia is common, affecting approximately two or three out of every 100 people.
Treatment
To correct amblyopia, a child must be made to use the weak eye. This can be done in several ways. Most often amblyopia is treated by patching or covering the child's strong eye for weeks or months.
Another method is prescribing glasses to correct errors in focusing. If glasses alone do not improve vision, then patching is necessary.
Amblyopia may also be treated by blurring the vision in the good eye with special eye drops or lenses. This forces the child to use the "lazy" eye. Even after vision has been restored in a weak eye, part-time patching of the strong eye may be required to maintain the improvement.
If your Eye M.D. finds a cataract or other eye problem, surgery may be required to correct that problem. Patching may still be necessary even after surgery.
Amblyopia cannot usually be cured by treating the cause alone. The weaker eye must be strengthened in order to see normally.
Without treatment, several problems may occur:
- the amblyopic eye may develop a serious and permanent visual defect;
- depth perception (seeing in three dimensions) may be lost;
- if the good eye becomes diseased or injured, a lifetime of poor vision may be the result.
Success in the treatment depends upon how severe the amblyopia is and how old the child is when treatment is begun. Children do not like to have their eyes patched, so parental care and involvement is essential.
Tests/Diagnosis
Amblyopia is detected by testing the vision in each eye. Since it is difficult to measure vision in young children, an Eye M.D. often tests how well a baby follows objects with one eye when the other eye is covered.
Using a variety of tests, the Eye M.D. observes the reactions of the baby when one eye is covered. If there is a weakness in the uncovered eye, the baby may try to look around the patch, try to pull it off, or cry.
Your Eye M.D. will also carefully examine the eye to see if other eye diseases may be causing decreased vision. These diseases include cataracts, inflammations, tumors, and other disorders of the inner eye.
Causes/Risk Factors
Any condition that affects normal use of the eyes and visual development can cause amblyopia. In many cases, the conditions associated with amblyopia may be inherited.
Amblyopia has three major causes. It occurs most commonly because of strabismus, or misaligned eyes. Another cause is refractive error, which means one eye is out of focus because it is more nearsighted, farsighted, or astigmatic than the other.
The other main cause of amblyopia is cataract or other disease that causes clouding of the eye's naturally clear lens. Any factor that prevents a clear image from being focused inside the eye can lead to the development of amblyopia in a child. This is often the most severe form of the condition.
