EVALUATION OF DEMOGRAPHIC PROFILE AND VISUAL OUTCOMES OF CATARACT PATIENTS OPERATED IN A CHARITABLE CAMP HOSPITAL IN CENTRAL INDIA
Authors:   Assistant Professor, Deptt of Ophthalmology, Sri Aurobindo Medical College and PGI, Indore., Prakash Pragya , Monga Ashima ,   Consultant, Thind Eye Hospital, Pathankot, Punjab.
Published: July 2024

Aim: To Study the Demographic Profile and visual Outcomes of Cataract Patients Operated in a Charitable Camp in Central India Introduction Cataract is a leading cause of preventable blindness globally. Developing countries account for three quarters of cataract blindness worldwide. Despite the large number of corrective surgeries being performed globally cataract blindness is believed to be increasing by1Ã‚Â–2 million/year. The present study was conducted in the patients residing in a peripheral rural area of Indore division (central India) to study the demographic and clinical profile of patients with cataract. This study supplements to understand the outcomes of such patients who were operated in camp at a tertiary care center. Study Design: It is a prospective descriptive study conducted on camp patients at a charitable tertiary eye care hospital (Central India) from December 2019 to February 2020.Wirtten informed consent was taken from patients for participation in this study. Setting: Department of Ophthalmology Choithram Netralaya, Indore from December 2019 to February 2020. Material and Methods: During the study period 139 surgeries were performed by the surgeon. All patients above 40 years of age having senile cataract with stable systemic condition were included. Patients with age less than 40 years of age, uncontrolled systemic condition, Patients with other ocular comorbidities, undergone previously any ocular surgery in the selected eye or not giving written informed consent were excluded.All the patients were screened for cataracts in the camps in the periphery by the trained optometrist and referred to the base hospital. Detailed pre-operative ocular examination of all the patients was performed and medical checkup with routine pre-operative profile was also done. Patients medically fit for cataract surgery underwent small incision cataract surgery with Posterior capsular IOL implantation (PCIOL) under local anesthesia. All the cataract surgeries were performed by a single surgeon using the same technique to avoid any bias. Results: It was observed that the mean age of presentation was 61.5 years with female preponderance of nearly (56.8%) . out of 139 patients 63 patients (45.3,%) had systemic comorbidities, which included ,33 patients (23.74%) with hypertension and 28 patients(20.14%) with Diabetes mellitus. Majority of patients i.e.101 (72.66%) patients had onset of ocular symptoms between 3 to 6 months . In this study bilateral immature nuclear cataract was commonly encountered cataract in 88.48% of patients and only 8 patients had mature cataract and 7 patients presented with hyper mature cataract respectively .On post-operative day one, 19 patients and 8 patients had blood clot in anterior hamber,5 patients had cortical matter in Anterior chamber On follow up at one week, majority of patients i.e 110 (79.13%) had visual acuity between 6/9-6/12.Patients after re-surgery had visual acuity of minimum up to 6/24 with possibility of getting better on further visits. Conclusion: In our study, increasing age and female gender were commonly associated with cataract. Most of the patients had bilateral cataract and low vision at presentation. Hypertension and type 2 diabetes mellitus were commonly associated systemic disorders with cataract.This study highlights that high quality cataract surgery with a low intra-operative complication rate and good visual outcome can be attained even in camp patients operated in the base hospitals with standard protocols.