Abstract
Introduction: Vision is the most important special sense in human being. Normal vision is essential for normal physical, mental, psychological development and education. Early detection and treatment of ocular morbidity is an easy way to improve child health and development.
Objectives: To estimate the prevalence of ocular morbidity among Tribal school children aged 5 – 15 years and socio-demographic factors related to it.
Materials and Methods: A school-based observational study with cross-sectional design was adopted to examine Tribal school children aged 5–15 years in randomly selected rural schools of Phansidewa & Naxalbari blocks of Siliguri sub-division in Darjeeling district from April - July 2018 with a sample size of 180. Interpretation and analysis of the data was done using IBM SPSS version 20.
Results: A total of 180 Tribal students 86(47.8%) males and 94(52.2%) females were examined. The overall Prevalence of ocular morbidity was high (51.7%). Allergic conjunctivitis (38.7%) was the major cause of ocular morbidity followed by Vitamin A deficiency (33.4 %) and refractive error (23.7%).
Conclusion: Data on ocular morbidity among Tribal school children is not readily available. Our study is one of the few studies to be conducted among the Tribal school children in rural area. A high prevalence of ocular morbidity among Tribal school children was observed. Since most of this morbidity is either preventable or treatable, school screening in tribal area forms an effective method to reduce this load.
Keywords: Tribal, School children, Ocular morbidity, Conjunctivitis, Refractive error
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Corresponding Author
Dr Louis Tirkey
Assistant Professor, Community Medicine, North Bengal Medical College & Hospital, P.O. Sushrutnagar, West Bengal, India, Pin: 734012
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it., Mobile: 9434234599
DOI: https://dx.doi.org/10.18535/jmscr/v6i9.38
