Joshua S. Gildea and Professor Richard K. Long, Communications

El Salvador is a third-world country in Central America that suffers from extreme poverty and a lack of quality medical attention. The country has experienced great natural disasters in the past few years including Hurricane Mitch in October 1998 and two major earthquakes in January and February 2001. While large amounts of food, clothing, and medical supplies have poured into the country, inadequate health care is a problem for many. In particular, visual health has largely gone unchecked.

In 1990, FUDEM was established as a charitable service organization with the specific objective of enhancing the visual health of the disadvantaged people in El Salvador. During the past decade FUDEM has largely worked with local church and community groups to reach those in need. Recently, however, FUDEM has become interested in reaching out to the children of El Salvador.

The purpose of this study is to determine the need for visual health care among school-age children in El Salvador.

The data for the study was acquired from two schools in Apopa, El Salvador, a suburb of San Salvador. A group of 2,164 students from ages 5 to 22 were given preliminary eye exams to determine eye care needs. The data was obtained on July 23, 2001 and August 8, 9 and 10, 2001.

The eye exams were given with a standard Snellen chart at a distance of six meters. The Snellen chart is made up of several lines of different-sized numbers used to determine visual acuity. During the exam students gave the examiner his/her name and age and the examiner tested the students with the Snellen chart for both left and right eye visual acuity. Students were required to read the chart at eye level while covering the eye not being tested. If a student could not read an entire line he/she was not asked to keep reading. The visual acuity of the furthest line the students could read was written down for each eye.

Once the information was gathered, it was sorted by age, sex, and visual acuity. The visual acuity results were grouped into six categories: better than 20/30, 20/30 –1, 20/30, 20/70, 20/100, and blind (20/200 or worse). Students who could not pass the Snellen eye exam at a 20/30 level were referred to an ophthalmologist. However, this does not necessarily mean that those who were referred needed visual correction.

Data from the study was grouped by age, from ages 5 to 22. However, students ages 5 to 8 and 19 to 22 were combined to obtain sample sizes large enough to make the results significant.

Study results found that 39 percent of the school-age children examined could not pass the Snellen eye exam at a 20/30 level. These students were referred to an ophthalmologist. The study also found that a smaller percentage of male students than female students were referred.

Only 36.5 percent of the male students were referred while 41.1 percent of the female students were referred. Figure 1 provides a breakdown of these results by age.

The study shows that grade school-age students (5 to 12 years old) were referred at a much higher rate than older students examined in the study. This shows the need for students to receive quality eye care at a young age.

With the proper funding FUDEM will be able to enter the public schools in El Salvador and provide adequate eye care at affordable costs.

The results of this study will be used by FUDEM to secure donations and funding for further work in the public schools of El Salvador.