Yesterday, Isaac and I spent 3 hours at Primary Children’s Hospital. Don’t worry. It wasn’t anything serious. We went to see the Ophthalmologist there. Isaac has an occasional wandering eye.
He has Intermittent Exotropia Strabismus.
To translate that: intermittent (sometimes) exotropia (wanders outward away from the nose) Strabismus (misalignment of the eyes)
I went in expecting to come home with eye patches but the doctor told us that it’s not a muscle thing, it’s a brain thing and patching the eyes wont do any good. Patches are only used when there is decreased vision in the eye, when it’s more of a lazy eye (amblyopia.) But strabismus can lead to amblyopia if not treated.
Isaac’s brain needs to tell the eye to focus. When Isaac’s eye wanders he needs to focus to snap it back into place. Doc said that we’d just monitor it, see him in 6 months.
If it gets worst, around the age of 7, we’d do surgery. If it wanders 50% of the time he’d need surgery. He said that 1/3 of kids grow out of it. 1/3 need surgery and 1/3 live with a mild case.
Surgery is only a cosmetic thing and doesn’t fix the vision. The child can loose total vision in the eye because his brain has been suppressing the double vision. Multiple surgerys may be needed. It just keeps people from saying “Hey, are you looking at me?”
So of course I came home and googled it. What the doc said seems to be right although there are a bunch of conflicting websites with all kinds of different stats. Doc didn’t say anything about vision therapy because of course he just does surgery. Depending on the severity depends on how aggressively it is treated. One site did say something about linking developmental delays such a speech with strabismus. Humm, sounds like Isaac.
Overall, the information seems a bit confusing. Do treatment. Don’t do treatment. It will help. It will do nothing or even make it worse. Hummm.
I went to bed with my eyes feeling quite achy.
ps. don’t look to closely at any of these photos of Isaac. His eye is not wandering in any of them.
Interesting. I was hoping for a more straight forward solution from the doc! But maybe it’s no big deal. We’ll hope he just grows out of it. Cooper uses the patch even though he doesn’t have decreased vision in that eye, but I think his is a muscle thing, so maybe that’s the difference. We see the doc again on Monday. Thanks for the update!!
By jodi on 08.21.09 4:22 pm | Permalink
Hi, I found your blog on a google alert for Amblyopia. While your son doesn’t have Amblyopia – I wanted to suggest that you check out the Little Four Eyes community which has a wealth of information from parents of kids with vision issues like your son and my daughter.
We are patching for Amblyopia which is definitely a challenge.
http://www.littlefoureyes.com
http://www.amblyopiakids.com
By MT/ Amblyopia Kids Network on 08.25.09 8:46 pm | Permalink
Hi. I’ve worked for an amazing pediatric opthalmologist for about 8 years now and just wanted to offer some helpful (hopefully
advice. It sounds as if the info your doctor gave you is spot on. Of all the strabismus out there, int. exo is more on the mild side, but also a bit harder to treat because it is a brain control problem and not something more specific. I would definitely recommend not getting involved in vision therapy. It is usually a waste of time and money and it’s a BIG source of income for less than reputable optometrists. Pencil pushups (drawing the eyes crossed and holding them for a few seconds) can be helpful with exotropia to strengthen control and can easily be done at home. Surgery is great in the right circumstances. Again, only if you see the XT more than not. It weakens or strengthens the eye muscles (depending on what’s needed), but it’s still up to the person’s brain to keep the images together. Hope that’s a little helpful!
By Laura on 08.27.09 10:50 pm | Permalink