Contents:
- Medical Video: Getting Rid of My Glasses! My Natural Eyesight Improvement Journey (See Description for Update)
- Get to know atropine to treat minus eyes in children
- When will atropine be used?
- How many doses of atropine are given?
- Atropine side effects
Medical Video: Getting Rid of My Glasses! My Natural Eyesight Improvement Journey (See Description for Update)
Minus eyes or in medical terms namely myopia found in school-age children in Southeast Asia, including Indonesia. High minus in children increases risk macular degeneration, glaucoma, and can even lead to blindness. To overcome this problem, researchers continue to develop minus eye drugs in children, one of which is atropine.
What is atropine and how does it work to treat minus eyes in children? Check out the full information below.
Get to know atropine to treat minus eyes in children
Usually the minus eye in children is handled using glasses. Glasses help the child's long distance vision to be more focused, not broken anymore.
In a study by a team of experts presented at the meeting American Academy of Ophthalmology in 2015, the use of atropine eye drops proved to be able to prevent the eye from getting worse with a success rate of up to 50 percent.
Previously, atropine was used to treat lazy eyes (amblyopia). This drug works by stimulating the widening of the pupils of the eye. However, experts found that atropine in very low doses apparently also was able to control the minus eye in children.
Unfortunately, until now researchers still have to study the effects of atropine on children's eyes even further. The problem is that it is not fully understood how these drops can help the eye minus the child.
When will atropine be used?
The use of atropine is given to children aged 6 to 12 years who have eyes minus 0.5 and for the past six months the minus has increased by 0.5. Atropine is used not to cure or restore the child's eyes to normal again. More precisely, this drug is used to prevent added minus.
Whereas a minus eye of 0.5 found in children under 5 years of age requires a more comprehensive evaluation to rule out other possible diseases such as congenital abnormalities in the formation of front eye segments.
How many doses of atropine are given?
There are various choices of atropine doses that can be used to treat the minus eye in children. The dose given depends on the minus level and also the child's eye reaction to this treatment.
The usual initial dose is eye drop atropine 0.01%. The drug is given every night to both eyes for two years or to a 15-year-old child.
The child must control the ophthalmologist every six months during the use of low-dose atropine. It is important to note the effect of treatment and minus additions (if any), as well as to progress the disease and make the necessary dosage adjustments.
Atropine side effects
According to research that has been done, the use of low-dose atropine eye drops is classified as safe or has little side effects for the eye or the body as a whole.
- Widening of the pupil by one millimeter
- Light accommodation disturbances (4 diopters)
- Impaired near vision
- Conjunctivitis allergy
- Allergic dermatitis
In the results of a recent study in 2016 in Singapore, this low dose of 0.01% atropine can reduce the speed of increasing eye minus in children with low side effects. Therefore, the use of this drug is good for long-term use during routine control of ophthalmologists.
