Comm Eye Health Vol. 32 No. 105 2019 pp 6. Published online 06 June 2019.

Cochrane Eyes and Vision: systematic reviews on myopia

Jennifer Evans

Assistant Professor (Epidemology): London School of Hygiene &Tropical Medicine, London, UK.


School boy sitting at a desk wearing spectacles
Providing free spectacles improves the number of children who have and wear their spectacles. PAKISTAN © Jamshyd Masood /Brien Holden Vision Institute
Related content

Cochrane Eyes and Vision (CEV) is an international network of individuals working to prepare, maintain and promote access to systematic reviews of interventions to treat or prevent eye diseases or visual impairment, and reviews of the accuracy of diagnostic tests. Systematic reviews are summaries of the best available evidence and are designed to answer a specific research question. The reviews featured here are published in the Cochrane Library, which is available free of charge in low- and middle-income countries via the Hinari Programme. www.who.int/hinari

1 Interventions to slow progression of myopia in children

www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD004916.pub3

Date: December 2011. Update due in 2019.

Key findings: Anti-muscarinic topical medication slows the progression of myopia in children. Adverse effects include light sensitivity and near blur.

2 Vision screening for correctible visual acuity deficits in school-age children and adolescents

www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/ doi/10.1002/14651858.CD005023.pub3

Date: February 2018

Key findings: Vision screening plus provision of free spectacles improves the number of children who have and wear the spectacles they need compared with providing a prescription only.

3 Laser photocoagulation for choroidal neovascularisation in pathologic myopia

www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD004765.pub2/

Date: March 2007

Key findings: The effect of laser photocoagulation to treat choroidal neovascularisation due to myopia is uncertain. Adverse effects include enlargement of the atrophic laser scar which is potentially vision threatening.

4 Anti-vascular endothelial growth factor for choroidal neovascularisation in people with pathological myopia

www.cochranelibrary.com/cdsr/doi/10.1002/14651858.CD011160.pub2

Date: December 2016

Key findings: Low and moderate-certainty evidence that people receiving anti-vascular endothelial growth factor have a better outcome in terms of visual acuity compared with no treatment, photodynamic therapy or laser. Adverse effects occurred rarely.