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Reduced visual resolution acuity and cerebral white matter damage in very-low-birthweight infants

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 February 2001

John Paul SanGiovanni ,
Elizabeth N Allred ,
D Luisa Mayer ,
Jane E Stewart ,
M Guillermo Herrera  and
Alan Leviton
John Paul SanGiovanni
Affiliation:
National Eye Institute, Division of Epidemiology and Clinical Research, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA.
Elizabeth N Allred
Affiliation:
Department of Neurology, Neuroepidemiology Unit, Children's Hospital (Boston), Boston, USA.
D Luisa Mayer
Affiliation:
Department of Ophthalmology, Neuroepidemiology Unit, Children's Hospital (Boston), Boston, USA.
Jane E Stewart
Affiliation:
Department of Neonatology, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, USA.
M Guillermo Herrera
Affiliation:
Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, USA.
Alan Leviton
Affiliation:
Department of Neurology, Neuroepidemiology Unit, Children's Hospital (Boston), Boston, USA.
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Abstract

Neonatal cerebral white matter echolucencies predict visual resolution acuity deficits in very-low-birthweight (VLBW) infants. We examined maternal sociodemographic, lifestyle, intrapartum, infant birth/perinatal, and ocular motor/refractive characteristics to determine whether they accounted for this association in infants who were tested once between postnatal age 25 and 56 weeks (corrected for gestational age at birth). Cranial ultrasound scans were read by consensus to identify echolucency in a population of VLBW infants with no known ocular abnormalities. Visual resolution acuity was measured with the Acuity Card Procedure (ACP) in 14 infants with echolucency and compared with that of 81 VLBW infants born in the same hospitals with normal ultrasound scans. In time-oriented logistic regression models, echolucency remained a consistent predictor of abnormal visual resolution acuity after adjustment for covariates in three developmental periods (pre-, peri-, and postnatal). Odds ratios ranged from 19.3 (95% confidence interval, 4.5 to 82.2; p=0.001) to 10.4 (95% confidence interval, 1.3 to 81.9; p=0.03). Reduced visual resolution acuity in VLBW infants appears to be due to cerebral white matter damage.

Type
Original Articles
Information
Developmental Medicine and Child Neurology , Volume 42 , Issue 12 , December 2000 , pp. 809 - 815
Copyright
© 2000 Mac Keith Press

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