What causes amblyopia in children?

Vision is one of the most important senses of people. It can be said that vision is the window through which people observe the world. The formation of vision begins during the childhood development period and gradually improves. Therefore, the development of children's vision is a key point that people need to pay attention to. In contemporary society, there are more and more examples of children with visual impairment. For example, amblyopia is a key factor affecting children's vision development. So, what are the causes of amblyopia in children?

1. Causes of form deprivation amblyopia:

In infancy, amblyopia can be caused by opacities in the refractive media (congenital or traumatic cataracts, corneal opacities), complete ptosis, iatrogenic eyelid sutures, and long-term indiscriminate covering of the affected eye to treat external eye diseases or covering the dominant eye to treat amblyopia. This type of amblyopia caused by insufficient light stimulation entering the eyeball, depriving the macula of the opportunity to receive normal light stimulation and causing visual impairment, is called deprivation amblyopia.

2. Causes of strabismic amblyopia:

Normally, the visual axes of both eyes are parallel, and the two eyes are kept focused on the center of the macula, so that binocular single vision can be achieved. After strabismus occurs, the visual axes of the two eyes are not parallel, and the image of the same object cannot fall on the corresponding points of the retinas of the two eyes at the same time. The two images on the retina will cause double vision and visual confusion. At this time, the cerebral cortex actively suppresses the visual impulses from the strabismic eye, and the macular function of this eye is suppressed for a long time, resulting in amblyopia.

3. Causes of anisometropic amblyopia:

Anisometropia (unequal refractive errors in the two eyes) is a common cause of visual deprivation in children. Due to the large difference in refractive error, the clarity of the images of the same object formed on the two retinas is unequal, making it difficult or impossible for the images of both eyes to fuse. The visual cortex center can only suppress the image from the eye with the larger refractive error, and amblyopia occurs over time.

4. Causes of refractive amblyopia:

Refractive amblyopia is often bilateral and occurs in patients with high refractive error who have not worn corrective glasses, especially those with high hyperopia. This kind of amblyopia does not cause inhibition of brain central functions because the visual acuity of the two eyes is almost the same and there is no binocular image fusion disorder. Therefore, after wearing suitable glasses, the vision will gradually improve without special treatment, but it will take a long time.