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The Pediatric Vision Screener III: detection of strabismus in children.

Nassif DS, Piskun NV, Hunter DG

Department of Ophthalmology, Children's Hospital Boston, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Mass 02115, USA.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the clinical performance of the Pediatric Vision Screener (PVS) in children in a pediatric ophthalmology office setting. METHODS: Seventy-seven subjects between 2 and 18 years of age received gold-standard orthoptic examinations and were classified as at risk for amblyopia if strabismus or anisometropia (>1.50 diopters) was present. Strabismus was subclassified as variable or constant. The subjects were then tested with the PVS, which produced a pass or refer recommendation based on a binocularity score. The PVS also produced a yield score to indicate the subject's interest in the target. Sensitivity and specificity for amblyopia risk detection were calculated. RESULTS: Binocularity as determined by the PVS was greater than 65% for all controls and less than 20% for all subjects with constant strabismus. Binocularity ranged from 0% to 52% in subjects with variable strabismus. All subjects with anisometropia and no strabismus had binocularity scores less than 10%. CONCLUSIONS: The PVS identified strabismus, when present, in all subjects and identified 3 subjects with anisometropia as well. The PVS shows potential to address a lack of screening instrumentation appropriate for use with preschool-aged children.

Published 11 April 2006 in Arch Ophthalmol, 124(4): 509-13.
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