Faisal Rasheed, Asad Aslam Khan, Raza Ullah Khan.
Refractive errors among children aged 6-15 years playing video games.
J Sheikh Zayed Med Coll Jan ;1(4):125-8.

Background: A refractive error is an error in the focusing of light by the eye and a frequent reason for reduced visual acuity. The burden of uncorrected refractive errors among our population is large and as effective interventions are available, prompt identification can improve quality of life. Objective: To determine association between duration of playing video games and different types of refractive errors among children between age 06 to 15 Years. Patients and Methods: In this cross sectional study 100 children (95 Male & 05 Female) were registered and vision of all the subjects were checked using a distance Snellens visual acuity chart. Retinoscopy and subjective refraction were done in the subjects having visual acuity less than 06/12 in one or both eyes. Questions regarding their habits of playing video games along with its duration were asked, with demographic features of each study subject. Results: Out of the 100 subjects, 18 were found to have refractive errors, mainly; myopia (72.22%), hyperopia (16.7%) and astigmatism (11.1%). Our study showed no significant relation of refractive error with their habit of playing different types of video games. However, there was significant relation between refractive error and duration of playing video games. Conclusion: It is concluded that there is a significant association between refractive errors and duration of playing video games in children, and this relation needs to be further explored on large scale.

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