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The Xichang Pediatric Refractive Error Study Report No. 7

Mingzhi Zhang, MD; Nathan Congdon, MD, MPH; Liping Li, PhD; Yue Song, MD, PhD; Kai Choi, PhD; Yunfei Wang, MBBS; Zhongxia Zhou, MD; Xiaojian Liu, MPH; Abhishek Sharma, MBBS; Weihong Chen, RN; Dennis S. C. Lam, MBBS, MD, FRCOphth

Arch Ophthalmol. 2009;127(6):776-783.

Objective  To study the effect of myopia and spectacle wear on bicycle-related injuries in rural Chinese students. Myopia is common among Chinese students but few studies have examined its effect on daily activities.

Methods  Data on visual acuity, refractive error, current spectacle wear, and history of bicycle use and accidents during the past 3 years were sought from 1891 students undergoing eye examinations in rural Guangdong province.

Results  Refractive and accident data were available for 1539 participants (81.3%), among whom the mean age was 14.6 years, 52.5% were girls, 26.8% wore glasses, and 12.9% had myopia of less than –4 diopters in both eyes. More than 90% relied on bicycles to get to school daily. A total of 2931 accidents were reported by 423 participants, with 68 requiring medical attention. Male sex (odds ratio, 1.55; P < .001) and spectacle wear (odds ratio, 1.38; P = .04) were associated with a higher risk of accident, but habitual visual acuity and myopia were unassociated with the crash risk, after adjusting for age, sex, time spent riding, and risky riding behaviors.

Conclusion  These results may be consistent with data on motor vehicle accidents implicating peripheral vision (potentially compromised by spectacle wear) more strongly than central visual acuity in mediating crash risk.

Author Affiliations: Joint Shantou International Eye Center of Shantou University and The Chinese University of Hong Kong (Drs Zhang, Congdon, Li, Song, Wang, Zhou, and Lam), and School of Public Health (Dr Li and Mr Liu), Shantou University, Shantou, China; Department of Ophthalmology and Visual Science (Drs Congdon, Sharma, and Lam), and Centre for Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health (Dr Choi), The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong; Department of Public Health, Oxford University (Dr Sharma); and Xichang Eye Center, Xichang, China (Ms Chen).

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