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TitreControl of visual loss from retinopathy of prematurity: challenges and opportunities
Abstract Nr.1003
ButRetinopathy of prematurity is a major cause of avoidable blindness and visual impairment in children in middle income countries, with SE Asia being the region with the highest estimated annual incidence. ROP is also likely to become a public health problem in Africa as services for preterm neonates expand.
In middle income countries challenges for control include lack of awareness amongst paediatricians, neonatologists, nurses who work in neonatal care and parents, coupled with lack of policies. Other considerable challenges include lack of skilled ophthalmologists either in terms of numbers or in terms of those who are willing to screen and/or treat sight-threatening ROP. Many neonatal units are inadequately staffed and/or equipped and so cannot provide the high quality care required to reduce the risk of treatment requiring ROP.
Opportunities for improving newborn care include novel approaches to training neonatal teams, and new wide-field retinal imaging systems are becoming available for screening. The latter provide the potential for members of the neonatal team to take and interpret retinal images at the cot-side. New treatments such as anti-VEGF agents are likely to become the first line treatment of choice in the future, once the optimal preparation and dosing regimes have been demonstrated them to be safe as well as effective in preterm infants.
Conflit d'intérêtNon
Auteur 1
NomGILBERT
InitialesC
VilleLondon, UK
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