Pediatric Eye Dictionary

More information about the conditions that we diagnose and treat

Amblyopia

What is it?

Amblyopia (lazy eye) is decreased vision in a child’s otherwise healthy eye that does not immediately improve with glasses. Rarely it can affect both eyes.

What causes it?

Amblyopia is an underdevelopment of the visual centers of the brain. There are three possible causes, and some children may have more than one cause:

Deprivation- light is blocked from entering the eye and the brain does not receive visual input. This is usually most severe in infants. Causes may include cataract (cloudy lens), corneal opacity (hazy front surface of the eye), ptosis (droopy eyelid), or blood inside the eye.

Strabismus (misaligned eyes)- not every child with an eye turn will develop amblyopia, but it is more common if one eye turns constantly.

Refractive (focusing)- when the two eyes have a large difference in prescription, they will focus at different distances. The brain will pick the eye that is easier to focus with, and the other eye will be ignored by the brain. Rarely, both eyes can develop amblyopia if the focusing problem in both eyes is very large.

How do we treat it?

Glasses- In many cases, the first step is to correct any focusing issues with glasses. Improvement in vision make take 2-6 months. About 50% of children will improve with glasses alone.

Patching- If glasses do not fully correct the amblyopia, a patch can be applied to the better-seeing eye for 2-6 hours per day to “force” the brain to see with the weaker eye.

Atropine- Atropine is an eye drop that can be placed in the better-seeing eye twice a week. It creates mild blur for near objects to give the weaker eye an advantage.

Surgery- Surgery may be performed to clear any of the causes of deprivation, or to re-align the eyes if strabismus is still present after treating the amblyopia.

Aniridia

Corneal abrasion
Chemical injury
Canalicular laceration
Chalazion
Corneal/Scleral laceration
Congenital glaucoma
Hyphema
Juvenile open angle glaucoma
Lid laceration
Morning glory anomaly
Neurotrophic keratitis
Neurofibromatosis
Nystagmus
Optic nerve hyploplasia
Traumatic Iritis
Tuberous sclerosis