Age, race and maternal smoking are associated with the development of myopia and hyperopia in preschool children, according to a poster presentation here. "Given that both myopia and hyperopia are risk factors for the development of amblyopia and strabismus, these risk indicators should be considered when developing guidelines for screening and intervention in preschool children," Mark S. Borchert, MD, and colleagues said in the poster presented at the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology meeting.

Comprehensive eye examinations were administered to 9,970 preschoolers aged 6 months to 72 months, and their parents completed questionnaires on socio-demographic information. The population-based cross-sectional study included African-American, Hispanic and non-Hispanic white children from contiguous census tracts in Los Angeles and Baltimore.

According to multivariate logistic regression, myopia was more prevalent in African-Americans and Hispanics when compared with non-Hispanic whites, the poster said.

Myopia was also more prevalent in children aged 6 months to 35 months when compared with those 60 months to 72 months.

Hyperopia was found to be more prevalent in non-Hispanic whites and Hispanics when compared with African-Americans.

In addition, hyperopia was more prevalent in children whose parents had health insurance and in those who had a history of maternal smoking during pregnancy, the poster said.

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