Eye Defects of Mentally Handicapped Children

Among 171 children who received routine ophthalmic and orthoptic examinations as part of their evaluation for suspected or known developmental handicap it was found that there was an unusually high incidence of ocular defects. Especially prevalent were high refractive errors (52%) and squints (40%), but there were also a number of other serious eye defects ranging from nystagmus and cataracts to microphthalmos. Because of this high incidence of eye defects it was considered essential that ophthalmic and orthoptic examinations should be part of the routine evaluation of developmentally handicapped children by the team of workers in an assessment centre.